Basketball and football are traditionally entirely different sports that have very little crossover in terms of strategy. However, the Kansas State Wildcats incorporated an intriguing inbound play on Sunday that was supposedly inspired by Kansas City Chiefs star Patrick Mahomes.
Kansas State had a late lead against Kentucky and had to deal with some full-court pressure from their opponent. They implemented a play that more resembles a pass play in football than anything traditionally used in basketball.
KSU head coach Jerome Tang called a play where all five players stood on the baseline. They then had two of the players set a screen to allow Markquis Nowell to cleanly catch the wide-open inbound pass.
It was essentially a bubble screen play that is very common in the NFL, and it worked to perfection when implemented by Kansas State.
Tang, a first-year head coach, was asked about the play after the game. He initially didn’t want to reveal where he got the play due to other teams potentially stealing the play. However, he finally revealed that the play is called “Mahomes” and that it is inspired by the Kansas City Chiefs.
“We actually call it Mahomes,” said Tang in a video shared on Twitter by PJ Green of Fox 4 in Kansas City. “Mahomes for Patrick Mahomes of the Super Bowl Champion Kansas City Chiefs.”
This actually isn’t the only time this NCAA Tournament that a football-style play has been run. Florida Atlantic also ran a popular football route called Mesh on Sunday, which is essentially multiple crossing routes to get the ball inbounds.
[NCAA March Madness on Twitter] [Photo Credit: CBS]
About Reice Shipley
Reice Shipley is a staff writer for Comeback Media that graduated from Ithaca College with a degree in Sports Media. He previously worked at Barrett Sports Media and is a fan of all things Syracuse sports.