Nov. 26, 2010

Box Score

LAS VEGAS, Nev. - D.J. Cooper scored 16 points and grabbed six rebounds but Ohio fell to No. 6 Kansas 98-41 Friday night in the third round of the iBN Las Vegas Invitational.

Marcus Morris scored 26 points, going 11 for 14 from the field, and had eight rebounds to lead the Jayhawks (5-0) past the Bobcats (3-2).

T.J. Hall (Gainesville, Fla.) set a career-high with six rebounds after grabbing eight through the first four games of the season. Nick Kellogg (Westerville, Ohio) scored seven points and is now averaging a little under seven points per game over his last three contests. Ethan Jacobs (Tipton, Ind.) also scored his first field goal as a Bobcat during the second half.

Ohio was 0 for 18 from beyond the arc, its worst performance from distance since it went 0 for 19 in a contest at St. Bonaventure on December 5, 1997. That game was also played on a neutral site, the Bradley Center in Milwaukee, Wisc.

The Bobcats shot a season-low 23.7 percent from the field compared as KU connected on 56.4 percent of its shots.

Ohio fell to 0-3 all-time against Kansas, 1-12 against Big 12 opponents and 3-18 all-time against top-25 programs on neutral courts. Kansas is now 7-0 at the Las Vegas Invitational. The Jayhawks won in 2006, defeating eventual national champion Florida in the championship game.

Tied at 2-2 early in the game, KU held Ohio without a field goal for nearly four minutes while the Jayhawks expanded their lead to 12-2. With 8:31 left to play in the first half, Marcus Morris hit a pair of free throws to jumpstart a 12-2 run by the Jayhawks, including six points from Marcus, as Kansas increased its advantage to 35-14. Marcus finished with 18 of his team-high 26 points in the first 20 minutes.

The Jayhawks never trailed, and eventually built their largest lead of the half at 43-16 before giving up the last four points before halftime.

Kansas went on a 17-2 run to start the second half and take a commanding 60-22 lead as it continued to pull well out of reach of the Bobcats shooting 72.4 percent from the field during the last 20 minutes. The Jayhawks' lead never got below 27 in the second half.

Travis Releford added 13 points while Markieff Morris had 11 points and eight rebounds for KU. Overall, they placed 12 players in the scoring column.

The 57-point margin of victory is KU's biggest regular-season win ever on a neutral court. It's the Jayhawks' 2nd-biggest win on a neutral court including the postseason. The only bigger win was a 58-point rout of Prairie View A&M in the 1998 NCAA Tournament.

Ohio takes on Santa Clara in the final round's third game on Saturday night.