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Kansas State Wildcats (2001: 11-18)

The following team preview is provided by Blue Ribbon. For the nation's most comprehensive look at this and all Division I teams, be sure to order the 2001-02 Blue Ribbon College Basketball Yearbook, on sale now at 1-800-775-2518.

The once-popular Asbury never really won back fans after interviewing at California a few years back and his teams didn't make much headway in the Big 12. By the end of his stay in 2000, the fans, what few were attending home games wanted a change.

Thoughts turned to a K-State man. After all, Asbury had come from Pepperdine and had no connection to Kansas State. It was time to dip into the program's proud past. Names like Mike Evans and Rolando Blackman surfaced. There was even a rumor that Tex Winter could sign on for a year or two and groom a successor from the bench.

Wooldridge wasn't on the early radar screen. But then-athletic director Max Urick like what heard about this Chicago Bulls assistant, and he liked what he saw at Iowa State, where Bulls' head man Tim Floyd had previously coached. It wasn't Winter, but Wooldridge had worked with Winter for a year in Chicago.

So it was without much enthusiasm that Wooldridge entered his first year in Manhattan, and some of the early results weren't encouraging. The Wildcats lost at Wichita State and needed a buzzer beating three-pointer to force overtime against Tennessee State. K-State won that game, but lost the next three.

A third crippling lost came at Old Dominion, a game in which the Wildcats led in the second half. A few of the players grumbled afterward about the team's deliberate style and triangle offense. Wooldridge and K-State needed something good to happen, and opportunity didn't seem to arrive with the 19th-ranked Iowa Hawkeyes two days before Christmas.

But K-State played exceptionally. Guard Larry Reid scored 31 as the Wildcats won going away. It was the first victory over a ranked non-league opponent during the regular season since 1981, and the purple people finally took plenty of cheer into the holidays.

A few weeks later, K-State knocked off ranked Missouri. Throughout the Big 12 season there were some lopsided losses, but not as many as in the recent past. When the season ended, the Wildcats had lost just as many as the previous year, but there were signs of life from Wooldridge's program. The off-season would be critical. Wooldridge didn't hesitate to make changes. He overhauled, adding eight new players. The ones who return form a good nucleus.

Backcourt

Matt Siebrandt, a 6-8, 240-pound junior, became the Wildcats' most consistent inside scoring threat (9.7 ppg, 3.8 rpg). He topped 20 points three times. Siebrandt is right-hander, except around the basket where his most effective move is to get a defender on his hip and go up strong with his left.

K-State's most valuable player a year ago was Reid (11.2 ppg, 3.2 rpg), a 6-0 senior. In his first season after transferring from Northern Oklahoma Junior College, Reid became the Wildcats' second-leading scorer. He averaged 3.8 assists and his 34.8 minutes per game was the third highest mark in the Big 12. Reid was an honorable-mention All-Big 12 choice last year, and also made the league's all-newcomer team.

"Larry has been a scoring point guard throughout his career,'' Wooldridge said. "We don't want to take that away from him. But we hope that by adding the players we have in the backcourt that we have improved his overall skill level and shooting ability.''

Those additions are three shooting guards who will fight for playing time.

Gilson DeJesus, a 6-5 junior and left-handed shooting specialist, is also originally from Sao Paulo, Brazil, gives the Wildcats more players from Brazil than from Kansas on roster. DeJesus averged 21.4 points for Trinidad (Colo.) Junior College, while shooting 52 percent from the field and 44 percent from behind the arc.

Marcus Hayes averaged 18.1 points, 6.1 rebounds and 3.1 assists for Oviedo (Fla.) High School last season and was chosen to the 6A all-state team. The 6-4 Hayes will walk on this season with the idea of getting a scholarship down the road.

Nick Williams a 6-4 freshman was selected the eighth best recruit in Texas after averaging 17.6 points for Mansfield High School.

All of them will battle veteran Phineas (pronounced, FINE-us) Atchison, a 6-1 senior who led K-State with an 11.7 scoring average. Atchison started the first six games and came off the bench for the final 22, averaging about 24 minutes per appearance. He was the team's most reliable three-point shooter at 40.5 percent. He joined Reynolds on the Big 12 all-bench team.

Frontcourt

Travis Reynolds, a 6-7 senior, was selected to the Big 12's all-bench team after averaging 10.5 points and 7.7 rebounds. He led K-State with a 52.3 shooting percentage and had the team's best power moves. Reyolds also led the Wildcats and was tied for seventh in the Big 12 in rebounding. He had six double doubles in 2000-2001, tied for fifth in the league. Reynolds had 17 double-figure scoring games.

Reynolds' high school teammate at Junction City High School in Junction City, Kansas, 6-7 junior Quentin Buchanan, is the Wildcats' best wing defender. He improved his scoring by three points to 7.3 last season and tried to provide more offense down the stretch when he averaged more than 11 field-goal attempts per game over the final four games.

Wooldridge brought in five newcomers to fight for spots up front, the best of whom are 6-9 junior forward Pervis Pasco and freshmen Travis Canby and Marcelo Da Barrosa. Pasco averaged 18.9 points and 8.6 rebounds at Pensacola (Fla.) Junior College, where he was regarded as one of the Top 20 junior college sophomores last season. Pasco also shot 61.5 percent from the field. The 6-9, 233-pound Canby comes to Kansas State from a year at prep school at Fork Union (Va.) Military Academy, where he averaged 10 points and seven boards. Before then Canby played at Holy Innocents Episcopal School in Atlanta. Canby's grandfather, Vern Schwentfeger, played for Hank Iba at Oklahoma State in the 1940s.

The top wing addition is junior Janerio Spurlock, a 6-6 slasher from Chipola (Fla.) Junior College. Spurlock averaged 20.2 points and shot 41.2 percent on three-pointers last season. He was selected one of the top 60 junior college players by one service. Spurlock is from Cincinnati.

Wooldridge wants to add a Kansan to the roster every year, even if there isn't one worthy of a Division I scholarship. Richard Nolan, a 6-9, 190 pound left-handed freshman from Scott City High School, averaged 21 points and 8.8 points last season.

Bottom line

Wooldridge has upgraded the Wildcats with a recruiting class that got in most top 50 national rankings just on the sheer numbers. Getting the newcomers to blend with the veterans, naturally, is a concern.

But Wooldridge is also looking for a better shooting team. Last season, K-State shot 41.2 percent from the field and 32.8 from behind the three-point line. Those numbers fall in line with previous Kansas State teams, but Wooldridge didn't coach those teams.

He demands better.

"No question about it, we have to improve our field-goal percentage,'' Wooldridge said. "We hope our overall skill level has improved.''

It has. Enough to make a push to the upper division? Probably not. But enough for Kansas State to grab five or six league victories and return to the NIT.