• Entering his seventh season on the bench at KU, Townsend
was ranked the 12th best high-major assistant in the country by
FoxSports.com
• Long regarded as one of the top recruiters in the nation,
Townsend previously served as assistant coach at Miami, Southern
Cal, Michigan, California and Eastern Kentucky.
• Townsend has coached numerous NBA players including KU's
contingent from the last four seasons - Wayne Simien, Julian
Wright, Mario Chalmers, Brandon Rush, Darrell Arthur, Darnell
Jackson, Cole Aldrich, Xavier Henry and Sherron Collins.
NCDS: Kurtis Townsend, Asst. Coach - Kansas
I must start with the accomplishment we achieved in our last home game when Kansas defeated Texas A&M-Corpus Christi (Nov. 23). The win marked the 63rd-straight home court victory for Kansas which set a school record. It’s also the longest active streak in the nation. I have been fortunate to be a part of every victory in the streak at historic Allen Fieldhouse. It’s a streak we hope to continue against a tough UCLA team tonight.
Coach Self says it best when he insists that it’s about all the players over the four seasons that helped Kansas since the streak started (the last four games of the 2006-07 season). There have been a lot of All-Americans and current NBA players in the streak, but it is also about every player that wore a jersey and sweated for KU.
The home court winning streak record is just one of many accomplishments in Coach Self’s time at Kansas. In his seven seasons, we have been a part of an NCAA title, a Final Four, six-straight Big 12 championships, four Big 12 Tournaments titles and won the school’s 1,900th and 2,000thall-time victories. I’m probably missing a few other accomplishments in there as well. Coach Self always deflects the praise and says it’s the players, but he deserves a lot of credit.
Our first road trip this season was to the Las Vegas Invitational over Thanksgiving weekend where we defeated Ohio and Arizona. Like home games, Coach Self likes to keep a routine when we travel with the main focus on the task at hand – basketball. We’ll have some fun and enjoy the event but the main goal is to play well and get better every day, be it in practices or games. We had a Thanksgiving dinner at the hotel with our team, staff and their families that made the trip. The players did enjoy some sights of Las Vegas. The next trip is New York City for the Jimmy V Classic. Madison Square Garden is such a historic venue and we haven’t played there since December 2006.
One highlight of when we go on a road trip like Las Vegas is that we have a player who is from the town. Elijah Johnson is from Las Vegas and he was able to visit with his family, friends, former teammates and coaches. It was great for us, as coaches, as we too got to know these people when we recruited Elijah when he was at Cheyenne High School. We have some players from the New York area – Tyshawn Taylor (Hoboken, N.J.), Niko Roberts (NYC) and the Morris twins (Philadelphia). It will be good for them to see and visit with some family and friends like Elijah did in Las Vegas.
Six games into the season, we are still growing as a team. After last season, we lost three NBA players – Cole Aldrich, Sherron Collins and Xavier Henry. This year’s team has a lot of talent and shows a lot more balance, which reminds me a lot of the 2008 team that won the title. Like that season, leaders will emerge. We are also looking forward to the addition of Josh Selby who has been practicing with the team and can play in his first game on December 18 against USC in Allen Fieldhouse.
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