K-State Q&A: Handshakes, Big 12 basketball awards, NIT options for Wildcats and more

Before we dive into your weekly questions about the Kansas State Wildcats, I want to take a moment to share how I voted for the media’s All-Big 12 Team this basketball season.

Every squad in the conference still has one game to play, so it’s possible I will need to tweak a spot or two if something incredible happens on Saturday. But I have watched enough Big 12 hoops over the past few months to think I’m ready to identify the best players and coaches in the conference.

Here we go ...

Player of the Year: Jamal Shead, Houston.

Newcomer of the Year: Hunter Dickinson, Kansas.

Coach of the Year: Kelvin Sampson, Houston.

All-Big 12 Team: Jamal Shead (Houston), LJ Cryer (Houston), Dylan Disu (Texas), Jalen Bridges (Baylor), Hunter Dickinson (Kansas).

All-Big 12 Second Team: Tylor Perry (K-State), Kevin McCullar (Kansas), J’Wan Roberts (Houston), Tamin Lipsey (Iowa State), Emanuel Miller (TCU).

It was pretty easy to choose both Player of the Year and Coach of the Year. Houston was an absolute wrecking ball. The Cougars dominated in their first season of Big 12 play, so they deserve the most love.

Newcomer of the Year was up for debate. I wish there was a better option than Dickinson, because I think he is an overrated player. Alas, he leads the conference in both scoring and rebounding. His stats are too good to ignore, even if he doesn’t always pass the eye test. I also just watched him drop 15 points and 20 rebounds on K-State live earlier this week.

I will be interested to see how my two teams line up with other voters. I have a feeling that I like Tylor Perry more than others, but maybe not. This hasn’t been the best season for K-State, but can you imagine where the Wildcats would be without him? He ranks fifth in the Big 12 in scoring. Iowa State will probably get more love than I showed the Cyclones here. Kevin McCullar is hard to rank, because of his injuries.

With 14 teams now in the league, it’s harder than ever to find consensus on these things.

Now let’s get to your questions. Thanks, as always, for providing them.

Assuming Kansas State falls short of the NCAA Tournament, can we expect a NIT invite for the Cats? - Andrew B. via e-mail.

Yes, odds are good that the Wildcats will be playing in the NIT.

The NIT changed its invitation rules to make more room for teams from power conferences this season. That means there should be more than enough space on the 32-team bracket for K-State.

Conference champions from the regular season are no longer guaranteed a spot in the NIT. So there is more space than ever for teams like the Wildcats.

Believe it or not, there are some maniacs out there who project the NIT like Joe Lunardi and Jerry Palm do for the NCAA Tournament. Those projections have K-State in the NIT as one of the middle seeds at the moment.

How does a postseason game at Drake, Ohio State or Butler sound? Or maybe K-State can host an NIT game at Bramlage Coliseum with a few more wins over the next week.

Has Coach Tang been too bullheaded in not utilizing the younger players on his roster when the “dudes” have been turnover prone and slumping? -@the_funky_andy via X.

Yes and no.

He has shown enough trust in Dai Dai Ames (a freshman) and Jerrell Colbert (a sophomore) to start them in nine straight games. Both of them have flashed potential, even though their play has been understandably inconsistent.

But Jerome Tang has been slower to warm up to other young players on his roster.

I am all for Dorian Finster, RJ Jones and Macaleab Rich seeing more playing time. Jones is an excellent shooter. Rich can make things happen around the basket. He’s an absolute bully with the basketball. Finister can play point guard and allow Tylor Perry to hunt for shots without the ball. These are valuable traits that could absolutely be utilized by the Wildcats.

Tang has been resistant to play those “youngsters” (to borrow a term from Bill Snyder) because they don’t always run offensive plays to perfection and they can be liabilities on the defensive end.

But if Cam Carter, Arthur Kaluma or Tylor Perry are having dreadful games, which has happened far too often lately, then what’s the harm in giving someone else a shot?

Which fellow K-State media member would you fly by in a handshake line? -@TheRealMasonV via X.

All of them, if the handshake came immediately after a basketball game in which a team I played for or coached lost by 22 points.

Maybe I would be less inclined to speed through a handshake line if my team won by 22, in which case I would only fly by the select few media members who have given me bad restaurant recommendations before road trips.

In all honesty, I’ve never been part of a handshake line that took longer than a few seconds.

Back in the day, when I played little league baseball, the goal was to get that thing over with as quickly as possible so everyone on both teams could run to the concessions stand behind center field and drink the free soda we were all promised.

Not much has changed now that I coach and watch youth sports teams in Manhattan. The handshake line always moves with lightning speed. If anyone wants to mingle, they do it five or so minutes later after the team meetings are over and everyone has gotten a snack and Gatorade.

Maybe we could learn something from that. College sports should replace the handshake line with drink and snack stations.

This clearly differs from Bill Self’s 10 rules of postgame handshake etiquette, but I don’t think anyone should complain about the amount of time another team spends in a handshake line. Refusing to shake hands at all is worthy of varying degrees of criticism, depending on the situation. But as long as hands are shaken, all obligations are fulfilled. It shouldn’t matter if the hand shake was a fly by or a bro hug.

Should the next KSU/KU coaches NIL fundraiser be an arm wrestling competition or who can shake hands the longest between Tang/Self? -@RobHud3 via X.

OK, that’s not bad.

They could also have one of those contests where Jerome Tang and Bill Self both have to put their hands on an automobile. The last coach standing wins a prize. Anything to make them spend an uncomfortable amount of time together. Self clearly wants to spend more time around Tang, right?

I have three more things to say about this silly handshake business:

1. This entire thing has been overblown. It shouldn’t have even been mentioned in the postgame news conference.

2. Jerome Tang should filibuster after the next Sunflower Showdown. He should shake Self’s hand and not let go until he is finished telling him his life story like Abe Simpson. If Self doesn’t like a quick handshake, why not keep him there at midcourt for several more minutes?

3. Bruce Weber and Self used to act like their hands were covered in acid when they shook hands. Why didn’t that bother anyone?

Am I out of my mind to think the O-Line could be better than expected for the coming year. Yes, fresh faces but more experience than people remember. What other position group might be better than what we think it is? What might be worse? -@ChadFullington via X.

I guess it depends on what your expectations are for the offensive line next season.

If you’re expecting K-State to be just as good up front as it was last year (or even better) then you are going to be disappointed. Cooper Beebe might have been the best offensive lineman that has ever put on a Wildcats uniform. He was the best player on the entire team last season and was at the center of the occasional highlight play, even though he was only doing the blocking.

There will be a drop-off without him.

But if you are expecting the Wildcats to start over from scratch next season then they absolutely have a shot to surprise. Hadley Panzer, Taylor Poitier and Carver Willis are all back. That’s a nice foundation to build from. Andrew Leingang, John Pastore and others are ready to take over as starters. Easton Kilty is a promising transfer.

There is more than enough talent in that room for K-State to put another quality offensive line on the field each Saturday. Blocking for Avery Johnson and DJ Giddens should give them plenty of margin for error, too.

I suppose the biggest fear with this group is that new coordinator Conor Riley spends too much time focused on the entire offense rather than just the O-Line and the blocking suffers as a result. But that seems unlikely.

My guess is the offensive line will be just fine, even if it won’t be quite as good as last season.