No. 2 Kansas beat Yale, 75-60, at fabled Allen Fieldhouse Friday night, but that hardly tells the story of the game.
Yale (7-6) raced out to a 15-11 lead on seven points from sophomore center Danny Wolf, who was being ineffectively guarded by Kansas (11-1) All-American center Hunter Dickinson.
Hall of Fame coach Bill Self put junior forward KJ Adams Jr. on Wolf. That stemmed the Wolf tide but did not stop the Bulldogs.
Yale took a 25-14 lead off of a 10-0 run to silence the sellout crowd of 16,300.
A 7-0 Kansas run ensued and Yale led 33-32 at the half.
Yale packed in its defense and stopped the lethal Kansas inside game. But graduate senior guard Kevin McCullar Jr. deluvered 14 first-half points for the Jayhawks.
The teams traded baskets in the first few minutes of the second half, and Kansas grabbed its first lead since early in the game at 43-42 on a Dickinson lay-in.
Kansas then went on a 25-4 run to put the game out of reach.
“We competed well but didn’t handle pressure in the second half,” Jones said.
McCullar finished with a career-high 34 points on 11-for-18 shooting from the field and an 8-for-8 showing from the charity stripe.
“My teammates put me in a position to make shots,” McCullar said.
Junior guard Bez Mbeng and senior guard August Mahoney led Yale with 13 points each. Wolf finished with 11.
Yale got a favorable road whistle, only getting called for 10 fouls. Kansas was charged with 12.
Kansas is now 18-0 all-time against the Ivy League.
The road does not get much easier for Yale, who is next in action at Santa Clara (8-5) on December 30.