MANHATTAN — A pair of double-digit road losses last week have done nothing to shake Kansas State basketball coach Jerome Tang’s confidence in his Wildcats.
As he was quick to point out Monday, what happened last week at No. 11-ranked Iowa State and No. 4 Houston, is simply the cost of doing business in the rugged Big 12.
“Eleven of the 14 teams in the Big 12 have lost back-to-back road games, and six of those 11 played back-to-back road games and lost both,” said Tang, whose Wildcats are back at home at 7 p.m. Tuesday to face No. 24 Oklahoma at Bramlage Coliseum. “And so, what just happened, we played two ranked teams on their home court.
“They’re probably both top 10 teams in the country and we lost a close one at Iowa State and then ran into a buzzsaw (at Houston). And so, we move on.”
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The Wildcats (14-6, 4-3 Big 12) rallied from a double-digit deficit to tie Iowa State before the Cyclones pulled away late for a 78-67 victory. They never were in the game against Houston, falling 74-52.
Now they must face an Oklahoma team (15-5, 3-4) coming off back-to-back home losses to Texas (75-60) and Texas Tech (85-84).
“Our whole thing all year is, the Big 12 is a one-game season, and after every game, win or lose, we put it in a box and we move on,” Tang said. “And we’ve had the same mentality moving forward with what happened (last week).”
K-State guard Tylor Perry said after the Houston game that he felt confident that the Wildcats would bounce back from the two losses good as ever.
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“I think this is a very resilient team with a resilient coaching staff, and like coach Tang said, it’s a one-game season and now we can’t dwell on this one,” Perry said. “We have another good contest coming up on Tuesday, and now we’ve got to get ready for that one.
“So, at the end of the day, every game matters in this league. We’ve got to get ready to prepare for the next one and going home. We’re going to have our crowd behind us, and we’ve got to get excited for that one.”
Tang echoed Perry’s sentiments.
“We’ve got a tough, gritty group who they care about each other, they care about this program, and they care about winning,” Tang said. “And we’re still on track to do everything we want to do.”
Arne Green is based in Salina and covers Kansas State University sports for the Gannett network. He can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter at @arnegreen.