It wasn’t exactly pretty at times, but in the end, the Kansas State Wildcats did exactly what they were supposed to do against North Dakota last Sunday evening, and posted a 42-point victory over a sub-300 KenPom team.
And in store tonight is another such opponent. The UAlbany Greant Danes come into tonight’s game at just 1-5, their lone win coming on Monday 64-62 over Eastern Illinois. 64 points is their high for the season, meeting that exact mark three times now. UAlbany was picked to finish 7th in the 10-team America East Conference, that may be best known to K-State fans as the home of NCAA Tournament ultimate-Cinderella UMBC (who were picked 5th this year, if you were curious). The Grea Danes are lead by Dwayne Killings in his first season as a head coach. Killings is familiar with the Wildcats, having been the associate head coach at Marquette from 2018-2021, coaching the teams that beat K-State in 2018 and 2019. Speaking of Marquette, they’ll be in town this time next week, so plan accordingly.
This is the first-ever meeting between the two schools on the men’s slate of the hardwood, and should be an easy-enough win for the Wildcats. Of course, this team is still coached by Bruce Weber, so anything could happen, but it’s unlikely that these Cats stumble too much tonight, unless they get caught looking ahead to this weekend’s trip to Wichita and the match-up with the Shockers at Intrust Bank Arena.
Tonight’s game from Bramlage Coliseum tips at 7:01pm CST and can be seen on Big 12 Now on ESPN+ with Ben Boyle (play-by-play), Stan Weber (analyst), and Kelsey Bigelow (sideline reporter) on the call.
If you haven’t subscribed to ESPN+, or just don’t want to, you can listen to Wyatt Thompson (play-by-play) and Matt Walters (analyst) call the game on much of the K-State Sports Radio Network, on XM Channel 389 and also available online on the The Varsity Network app and at K-StateSports.com.
PROJECTED STARTING LINEUP
Kansas State Wildcats (3-2)
G: #00 Mike McGuirl
G: #13 Mark Smith
G: #21 Nijel Pack
F: #25 Ismael [Ish] Massoud
F: #20 Kaosi Ezeagu
UAlbany Great Danes (1-5)
G: #5 Jamel Horton
G: #20 Matt Cerruti
G/F: #3 Trey Hutcheson
F: #2 Dre Perry
C: #24 Paul Newman