Nathan Friedman/Special to the Journal-World
Kansas guard Melvin Council Jr. rushes the ball down the floor with teammates Darryn Peterson and Elmarko Jackson during the game against North Carolina State on Saturday, Dec. 22, 2025, in Raleigh, N.C.
As Kansas coach Bill Self put it on Monday morning, Melvin Council Jr. was so good against N.C. State in Saturday’s overtime win at the Lenovo Center that it “covered up a lot of things.”
“Just being totally truthful, you take Melvin out of the equation and who could you turn to (and) say, ‘They really had a nice game the other day’?” he said. “And a lot of it’s not individual, a lot of it is what are we doing to help the other person and that kind of stuff. And it wasn’t very good.”
Indeed, Council’s historic and unpredictable performance — the numbers, repeated so frequently since Saturday night, speak for themselves: 36 points, 13-for-27 shooting, nine 3-pointers when he previously had five total on the season — masked what was otherwise a pretty lackluster offensive day for the Jayhawks.
Flory Bidunga, who Self has said should develop into KU’s second option on offense, was hampered by foul trouble and finished with eight points on seven shots. Tre White, previously 13-for-29 on the year from deep, went 0-for-6 beyond the arc and didn’t draw nearly as many of his usual fouls (Self said he “tried to drive gaps that weren’t there”). The bench provided two points. Even Darryn Peterson, who scored 17, “wasn’t moving at the pace that he’s got to move at the way people are going to guard him,” Self said.
And then he exited the game before it concluded due to “quad cramping” — not the hamstring injury he had previously contended with, Self said — and his status is unknown for Tuesday night’s home game against Towson.
Whether Peterson makes it back to the floor against the Tigers or misses his eighth game of the year, Self will be looking for the Jayhawks to display a more dynamic offense with renewed ball and body movement. He said they have been playing “ridiculously slow” on that end of the floor and haven’t moved the ball well since beating Tennessee without Peterson on Nov. 26.
“We don’t have a team full of one-on-one guys,” Self said. “When Darryn’s out there, he can hold it and it can stick and he can get his own. Everybody else has got to be a ball mover, shooter or a passer immediately, or a better screener. You can’t be a stander, and we’ve got way too much of that going on.”
The team coming to Allen Fieldhouse at 8 p.m. Tuesday is the favorite in the Coastal Athletic Association. Towson will have had more than a week to prepare for KU after losing 86-61 at UCF on Dec. 7, the same day the Jayhawks faced Missouri. The Tigers are 6-4 on the year and have not won a road game, though they did beat a pair of teams just outside KenPom’s top 100 in Rhode Island and Liberty at the ESPN Events Invitational in Kissimmee, Florida.
Towson’s scoring originates chiefly from three sources (no one else averages more than 4.8 points a game): Tyler Tejada, Dylan Williamson and Jack Doumbia Jr.
Tejada is the league’s preseason player of the year — he was its rookie of the year in 2023-24, and player of the year in 2024-25. The 6-foot-9 wing averages 18.8 points and 5.7 rebounds per game and is a sophisticated shot creator who can also get hot from distance, as he did when he went 6-for-10 from deep in a win over Cornell on Dec. 3.
The guard Williamson is a high-volume shooter who has already taken more than 20 shots in a game twice this year and is putting up 15.6 points with 3.3 assists, while Doumbia, a Wright State transfer, is a slasher who can also pull up and provides a spark off the bench.
“I think they’re good,” Self said. “I think they play really hard and extremely active. They can shoot it from four spots. I think they got a nice team.”
The rest of Towson’s lineup does not provide much on the offensive end. For example, the Tigers have a starting forward, Caleb Embeya, who has attempted 13 shots on the season (and made five). They rank 314th in the nation in scoring at 70.3 points per game, and their ball movement yields just 10.5 assists per game, which is 353rd of 365 teams.
On the flip side, they’re allowing 68.2 points on defense — a respectable 81st.
After emerging with the hard-fought win over N.C. State, the Jayhawks are 8-3 and rank No. 17 in the nation with losses to Nos. 3, 5 and 12 — primarily playing without their star guard Peterson. If they can beat Towson on Tuesday and Davidson next Monday to emerge at 10-3, “you would think, ‘OK, we survived the preseason,’” Self said.
“I’m really looking forward to tomorrow’s game,” he added. “Hopefully we’ll come out and play with the passion and the energy and the pace that good teams play with.”
No. 17 Kansas Jayhawks (8-3) vs. Towson Tigers (6-4)
• Allen Fieldhouse, Lawrence, 8 p.m. Central Time
• Broadcast: ESPN2
• Radio: Jayhawk Radio Network (in Lawrence, KLWN AM 1320 / K269GB FM 101.7 / KKSW FM 105.9 / KMXN FM 92.9)
Keep an eye out
Council continuation: Council had not shot 30% or higher from deep in either of his Division I seasons before coming to KU and he was down at 18.5% this fall before going 9-for-15 on Saturday. That single performance boosted his season-long mark to 33.3%. He evidently won’t make two out of three 3s in every game, but the showing did demonstrate he can score from the outside “if he plays without thinking about it,” Self said. Also, as he did on Saturday, he’ll need to continue with his bread-and-butter offensive game, which consists of using his speed to get to the rim, while occasionally mixing in the outside shots.
No second chances: KU is averaging 9.5 offensive rebounds per game, which ties for 317th in the country. Self mentioned that as a potential area for improvement. That mark is despite starting what is in some sense a three-forward lineup with a big wing in Tre White and post players Bryson Tiller and Flory Bidunga, and it forms a stark contrast with their status as the nation’s No. 11 team, tied with Columbia, in terms of defensive rebounding. (The Jayhawks are also, by the way, tied for second-worst in the nation in terms of forcing opponent turnovers. That’s not helping them get out and run or generate additional opportunities for their offense.)
Standing pat: KU is now on winter break, and last year the Jayhawks took advantage of the semester break to add Tiller, who was rehabbing an injury suffered while playing for Overtime Elite. He didn’t contribute to the 2024-25 team on the court but was able to settle in ahead of his early playing time as a freshman this fall. This year, KU isn’t going to add anyone for the second semester, Self said on Monday, unless something could “fall in your lap or out of the sky.” The Jayhawks, are though, still working on their recruiting class for the fall of 2026, and junior-college guard Trent Lincoln will visit Lawrence for the Towson game.
Off-kilter observation
When Tejada earned CAA rookie of the year honors in 2024, he became Towson’s first major award recipient since Nick Timberlake was the sixth man of the year in 2020. Timberlake, of course, played for KU during the 2023-24 season.
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Written By Henry Greenstein