Slate: Revisiting Jacob Pullen’s Visit

Football

Win games, and players win awards. As JT chronicled yesterday, the Big 12 honored both Duke Shelley and Alex Barnes as conference players of the week. Since a punter won the special teams award, you have to think Isaiah Zuber might have picked up an honor, too, had he not stepped out of bounds on what otherwise would have been a long kick return touchdown. Ah, well.

At the Kansas City Star, Kellis Robinett graded the team’s performance against Oklahoma State, quantifying marked improvement in several areas.

You don’t have to subscribe to The Athletic anymore to read about Duke Shelly and Alex Barnes’s breakfast meeting, linked in yesterday’s Slate. (But you do have to subscribe to the Capital-Journal. Sigh.)

On Monday, all-everything good guy Dalton Risner was speaking to students at Amanda Arnold Elementary School when Laura Pray, a representative of Allstate Insurance Company, presented him with a plaque for being named to the 2018 American Football Coaches Association (AFCA) Good Works Team. Risner, who is also a finalist for four other public service-based awards, was not expecting to be honored at the event, though he had an inkling something might be up when he saw members of the media and academic advisers in attendance.

Tennis

Sophomore Anna Turco won the consolation bracket of the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Central Regional Championship in Iowa City. She won the semi-final round by default when Oklahoma’s Jasmine Asghar withdrew due to injury. She beat Ivana Corley, also of Oklahoma, in straight sets, 7-5, 6-1, to claim the consolation bracket win.

Golf

Senior Cloe Weir equaled her career-low score in the second round of the Magnolia Invitational, posting a 3-under-par 69 to climb 18 spots on the leaderboard. Unfortunately, an erratic first round score of 85 keeps her far down the standings, in 57th place. Ella Adams actually leads the Wildcats in 30th place individually, at +4. Collectively, the ‘Cats are tied for 10th in the 13-team field, with one round to play.

Basketball

We missed highlighting this earlier, but it still bears mention. Most of us are aware that Jacob Pullen did not support Bruce Weber’s hire at K-State, even tweeting angrily about it when John Currie announced Weber as Frank Martin’s replacement in 2012. Over time, Jake has grown to support Bruce, though, saying he now has the “utmost respect” for his efforts in Manhattan. Pullen was at the Madness in Manhattan event Friday night, where he helped judge the dunk contest. He also spoke about his growing respect for Coach Weber and desire to have Bruce and a host of other people present when his jersey is raised to the rafters of Bramlage.