GREENSBORO, N.C. – It took a while for everyone in purple to leave the floor, because as eager as the Kansas State Wildcats may be to get to the Sweet 16, well, weren’t they already there, even on the floor of the Greensboro Coliseum? The Sweet 16 was theirs the moment they finished off those other Wildcats. It goes where they go.
And they go where Markquis Nowell takes them. Which, to this point, has been pretty doggone far. At 5-8, 160 pounds, Nowell is the shortest All-American chosen by the Sporting News since Kentucky’s Tyler Ulis in 2016, and Ulis was right there on the UK bench as a student assistant coach watching the player who has succeeded him as a small player capable of accomplishing big things.
It took the tiniest great player in college basketball’s 2022-23 season to take down the biggest brand in the sport, 75-69 in the NCAA Tournament second round at Greensboro Coliseum. Nowell slayed the giant with 27 points and 9 assists – 23 of those points in the second half as he toyed with Kentucky’s struggling pick-and-roll defense.
TSN's MARCH MADNESS HQ
Live NCAA bracket | TV schedule | Predictor tool
Nowell delivered the pass on the only two 3-pointers his teammates made, one by Ismael Massoud with 2:19 left to put K-State ahead for good and one by Keyontae Johnson with 1:23 remaining to essentially clinch the victory. So Nowell had a direct hand in 47 of his team’s points.
“The analogy I use with him is the lion is the king of the jungle, but because it does everything in a pride – together. They kill and they share,” K-State coach Jerome Tang told the Sporting News. “The tiger is the biggest, fastest, strongest, but it will only eat when it can kill. I tell him: You’re a tiger by nature, but I need you to be a lion about 36 minutes, and then the last 4 minutes you can be a tiger.
“Well, I needed him to be a tiger the second half today.”
It was Nowell who tipped off the school’s athletic director, Gene Taylor, to look into the possibility of hiring Tang when the school and Bruce Weber separated after last season. It was Markquis’ brother Marcus who did the scouting on that, recommending the man who had been a Baylor assistant for 20 seasons and helped Scott Drew build the Bears from their predecessors’ scandal to the 2021 NCAA champion.
It was Nowell who was coming off a season in which he averaged 12.4 points and 5 assists and, though such numbers would be greatly valued to many big-time programs, remained committed to Kansas State. He was one of only two players left in the program after last season, along with Massoud.
“Coach calls it ‘crazy faith.’ What one person calls crazy, the other person calls it faith,” Nowell told the Sporting News. “And I just had faith that this team would be in March, no matter who I was playing with. I was determined back in the offseason to be in this moment. And I’m just grateful and thankful that God gave me the opportunity to play in March.”
MORE: Nowell dazzles with no-look passes, deep threes
There will not be such gratitude from those practicing the religion of Big Blue Nation. Their team, seeded No. 6 in the East Region behind K-State’s No. 3, had a chance to win this but ultimately could not solve the puzzle of controlling Nowell in ball screens. Tang had Nowell attack any exchange involving UK’s massive center Oscar Tshiebwe, who rang up 25 points and 18 rebounds but was unable to cope with Nowell, 13 inches shorter and 100 pounds lighter.
“The man was very fast. He was tough for us,” Tshiebwe told TSN. “Coach had good plans. We were trying to push him back, but he would just work harder. We kind of stopped him a little but, but I give credit to K-State. They did a better job because that dude is very fast.”
Kentucky contained Nowell well enough in the first half to hold the lead for more than half the game, but its own offense was so vacant that eventually K-State’s attack prevailed.
There was a moment in the second half, with 9:53 left, when Kentucky freshman forward Chris Livingston popped wide open behind the 3-point line, his team trailing by four points. He took the shot, because it was so inviting and because there was no one else on his team consistently making jumpers. It helped the Wildcats momentarily that the shot connected, closing the gap to a single point on the way to a 4-point lead on Lance Ware’s equally unlikely dunk with 4 minutes left.
Livingston’s bucket was a clear statement about the Wildcats’ circumstance on this day. If they were going to be reliant during the closing minutes on Livingston, a 30-percent shooter from deep, there were going to be problems.
Antonio Reeves, the team’s best deep shooter, had made 41 percent of his threes and hit 79 of them entering Sunday. He ended the season with 79 makes. Oh, no, wait. He made his 80th on a meaningless attempt with 6.3 seconds left and the game out of hand. He was 1-for-10 from deep.
Jacob Toppin, the team’s No. 3 scorer, shot 1-of-7 from the field. UK was just 4-of-20 from 3-point range. The misses included the shot Livingston’s initial 3-pointer presaged would arrive, a left-corner attempt with Kentucky down 64-62. That he did not make it seemed all but inevitable, but he was not wrong to try. He’d seen what the rest his teammates were capable of delivering.
“This is what happened in certain games,” Calipari told reporters. “You turn around and you are like: Guys, you don’t have to make them all. You just can’t miss them all. And we’ve had games like that. You just hope in the NCAA Tournament, you can go on a run.
“Talking to friends of mine, they were like: You are due for a big shooting night. I was trying to build up Antonio for two days: You’re going to have a great game. You’re going to shoot it. Then throughout the game we just kept telling him what? Keep shooting. Just wasn’t that day for him. And it wasn’t his fault. We had other guys not make shots, either.”
The Wildcats' next step on their Sweet 16 road goes through Madison Square Garden, which surely is a dream for Nowell, Massoud, and Nae'Qwan Tomlin, all from Harlem, as well as Queens product Tykei Green.
"Dudes. We got dudes," Tang said. "That's what it takes. People get all caught up in the coaching, and all that. It's dudes. You got to have players. And these dudes, they work."