No. 1 Kansas Too Much for Koul

Alexander Koul, George Washington’s center who is projected as a high NBA draft choice, welcomed the opportunity to take his game to Lawrence, Kan.

So did NBA scouts, who showed up Wednesday night to see how he fared against the tall Jayhawks.

The answer is better than the Colonials did, but not as well as Jerod Haase, who scored 22 points to lead No. 1 Kansas to an 85-56 victory over George Washington.

“It was a real good challenge to play against such good players,” Koul said. “It was just challenging.”

It was also frustrating when Kansas’ Raef LaFrentz and Scott Pollard fronted him and other Jayhawks played behind.

They held him to 16 points and seven rebounds, and LaFrentz, Pollard and Paul Pierce combined for 31 points and 24 rebounds.

Kansas (8-0) outrebounded the Colonials, 26-8, in the first half, including 11 offensive rebounds, but led only 36-29 at halftime.

Haase scored nine points in a 25-4 run in the opening 7:38 of the second half that put away George Washington (5-3).

He had a three-point basket, two driving layups and a breakaway dunk on a blind pass from Pierce in the flurry.

“He did everything right tonight,” Kansas Coach Roy Williams said.

“He took good shots and the passed the ball to our players instead of their players.”

Haase has been plagued with turnover problems but had none Wednesday night.

The Jayhawks finished with a 52-25 rebounding advantage and held the Colonials to 31% shooting.

Point guard Ryan Robertson, continuing to fill in for injured Jacque Vaughn, had a team-high eight assists and hit all three of his shots.

No. 5 Michigan 76, St. John’s 61--At Uniondale, N.Y., Robert Traylor converted a three-point play to give the Wolverines the lead for good, then fed Travis Conlan to make the score 51-47 in the second half as the Wolverines staved off a Red Storm (2-3) rally and ran their record to 6-0 for the first time since they won the national championship in 1988-89.

Maurice Taylor, who finished with 19 points, was called for his fourth foul with 11:59 to play but returned 2:30 later to lead an 11-5 run that kept Michigan in control.

No. 6 Iowa State 74, Drake 50--Six-foot-11 Kelvin Cato scored 21 points, grabbed 13 rebounds and dominated a Drake front line whose tallest starter was 6-7 freshman Andy Nath in the Cyclones’ (5-0) victory in Ames, Iowa.

Drake, 0-6 under first-year Coach Kurt Kanaskie, is off to its worst start since the 1931-32 team lost its first six.

Nath led the Bulldogs with nine points.

No. 14 Duke 85, Davidson 58--Trajan Langdon and Steve Wojciechowski made three-point baskets 30 seconds apart to start a 24-8 second-half run for the Blue Devils (6-2), who got 22 points from Greg Newton and 19 from Ricky Price to win in Durham, N.C.

Landry Kosmalski and Narcisse Ewodo led Davidson (4-3) with 11 points each.

No. 22 Louisville 80, Dayton 67--DeJuan Wheat scored 18 of his 25 points in the second half in Louisville for the Cardinals (5-0), who shot 55% and withstood a 17-4 Dayton run in the second half in beating the Flyers (2-2) for the 19th time in a row.

OTHER GAMES

San Jose State, which is off to only its second 5-1 start since 1972, got 19 points from Olivier Saint-Jean to lead four players in double figures in a 65-53 victory over San Francisco (3-3) in San Jose. . . . Lorenzo Rollins scored 26 points and added nine rebounds and six assists for Gonzaga (4-3), which was a 91-76 winner over Montana State (3-4) at Spokane, Wash. . . . Kevin Turner scored 15 points for Illinois (7-2), which had no problems at Champaign, Ill., in a 94-57 win over Chicago State (0-6), which hasn’t won on the road since the last game of the 1994-95 season. . . . Mikki Moore had 19 points to lead Nebraska (6-1), which took a 10-3 lead over Missouri Kansas City (2-4) and never looked back in a 59-55 victory at Kansas City. . . . Torrance Archie hit all nine of his shots for 18 points for Virginia Commonwealth (2-2) in a 79-59 victory over Southwestern Louisiana (0-5) in Richmond, Va. . . . Mike Jones scored 19 points and sparked an 8-0 run in the second half for Southern Mississippi (4-3) in a 75-56 win over Nichols State (2-3) in Hattiesburg, Miss.