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It wasn't a work of art, but Kentucky did what it needed to do in order to secure a 56-49 win over Kansas State to open its 2014 NCAA Tournament run.
While other games like VCU-Stephen F. Austin and UVA-Coastal Carolina were going crazy, these two were playing a fairly unremarkable game. Neither team had much luck scoring early on, as the score was just 13-10 Kentucky with 11 minutes gone in the first half. A 13-4 run from there by Big Blue helped open up a nice 24-14 margin, but KSU did close that up to a six-point halftime lead. The second half was full of just some ugly ball, with long droughts like a stretch from 10:00 to go to 5:30 to go where the teams managed just two points each. UK might have missed out on the magic number of 70, but it didn't matter a whole lot with KSU not even making it above 50 points.
Julius Randle had a big second half to lead all scorers with 19 points and 15 boards, while Aaron Harrison backed him up with 18. Marcus Foster was the high point man for Kansas State with 15, and Shane Southwell contributed 11. Neither team managed to shoot even 40% from the field, 30% from three, or 70% from the line.
In the next round, UK will taking on 1-seed Wichita State.