EW YORK -- There were several stages in the game where they put together an output good enough to match any college team in the country. The eighth- ranked team couldn't get the ball near halfcourt against them. They scored crucial baskets down low and from outside.

Although those surges covered a total of about five minutes, they showed why the University of Massachusetts belonged in the Preseason National Invitation Tournament final.

It was the other 15 minutes that got them in trouble.

In those minutes, the Minutemen were plagued by the type of miscues that before last night they had covered with scrappy defense and offensive surges. They missed free throws. They missed shots. They turned the ball over. They made poor passes.

They were battling back so often that in the end they ran out of steam. Kansas, which unlike Carolina bent but kept its poise under UMass' pressure, walked away with an 86-75 win over the Minutemen to become the first team to win two Preseason NIT titles.

Kansas (4-0) was led by tournament most valuable player Richard Scott, who scored 16 points to lead six Jayhawks in double figures. Kansas, which shot 46 percent from the floor and turned the ball over 23 times, held UMass to 35 percent shooting. The Jayhawks' best defender was guard Steve Woodberry, who covered UMass guard Mike Williams like latex stain. Williams (8 points), who burned North Carolina with 17 points on Wednesday, didn't score a field goal until the 6:30 mark of the second half.

"Woodberry did a great job on Mike Williams," said Kansas coach Roy Williams. "Lou Roe hurt us, as did Dana Dingle. But Woodberry did a great job."

The 6-foot-6-inch Roe continued his offensive onslaught, scoring 25 points. But he was horrible from the free throw line again, and this time it was costly. Roe missed 7 of his first 8 and finished 7 of 20 from the line.

"Lou Roe's killing this team," said Roe, who along with Dingle (20 points) was named to the all-tournament team. "I shot 80 percent from the line last year. I don't know what it is, but I have no excuses for it. It's just something I have to work on."

The Minutemen came up with practically every loose ball against Carolina. Last night they were a step too late getting to many of them. Add to that bad passing, and it looked as if UMass would be in for a long evening after jumping out to a 10-6 lead then watching Kansas settle down, step up its defensive pressure and take control midway through the first half.

The Minutemen rallied from a 10-point deficit with 2:47 to trail, 39-35, at halftime. Then UMass failed to score in the first 3 1/2 minutes of the second half. Dana Dingle scored the first points of the second half with 16:24 left but that only made the score 49-37, Kansas.

With 14:30 left, Greg Ostertag scored to give the Jayhawks a 53-37 lead. Then the Minutemen staged a furious run with two 3-point baskets by Derek Kellog and a bank shot by Roe to pull to 57-48 with 11:19 left. With 10:18 to go, Roe scored on a 5-foot fadeaway to pull the Minutemen to 57-52.

But Kansas guard Jacque Vaughn nailed a 3-point basket at the other end to start a 8-3 run that gave the Jayhawks a comfortable cushion again at 65-55 with 7:40 left.

"I don't think we ever got anxious," said Scott. "We talked about keeping our poise and we kept our poise."

Said Roe, "When we jumped out to the early lead, I think we got comfortable and a little lax. Kansas battled back."

UMass played without starting center Marcus Camby, who yesterday underwent a magnetic resonance imaging test on his right knee, which he injured Wednesday night against North Carolina. The MRI showed that Camby has fluid buildup in the knee and a bone bruise. Tests were inconclusive, however, on the status of his anterior cruciate ligament.

Camby, a freshman from Hartford, will undergo a diagnostic arthoscopy Monday to determine the full extent of the damage.

EW YORK -- John Calipari said this year's University of Massachusetts basketball team would be ugly early. The coach warned not to expect much. But when you defeat the No. 1 team in the nation, people don't listen to such talk anymore. They believe you spoke too soon.

The fact is UMass did play ugly in its 81-76 overtime win over top-ranked North Carolina Wednesday night, but the Minutemen offset that with tremendous scrappiness on defense and the offensive glass. They also hit clutch shot after clutch shot. Moreover, against one of the better pressing teams in college basketball, they committed just 12 turnovers.

That overshadowed the fact that UMass shot 36 percent from the floor in the first half, 44 percent from the line in the second half, and were outscored, 11-0, in the game's first 3 1/2 minutes.

In its 86-75 loss to Kansas in the final of the Preseason National Invitation Tournament Friday, UMass was still plagued with such ugliness, but unlike the North Carolina game, it couldn't summon enough scrappiness to offset the miscues.

Yet the Minutemen can take consolation in the fact that when they played their scrappy best, they were good enough to defeat the defending national champion. All they need to do is eliminate some of the ugliness.

"We learned a little bit about our team; we could be a pretty good basketball club," said Calipari. "And we learned that in spells if we try to do it on our own as we did early on against North Carolina, we're not very good. We also learned we have to shoot the ball better than 40 percent, which we've done throughout this tournament.

"We've got to start creating better shots for each other, and we also found out we're a pretty good rebounding club. I think we found out some things about our players. We know who we can go to on the bench to help us.

"We know what we have to work on now. That's the biggest thing you learn. If we're going try to win our league again and go to the NCAA Tournament again, it's obvious what we can do with this team."

Among those who have discovered some problem areas are junior power forward Lou Roe, who scored 53 points in the two games at Madison Square Garden but might have picked up most valuable player honors had he not shot 13 for 35 from the free throw line.

Roe won't have much time before suiting up again. The Minutemen left New York City at 9:30 yesterday morning for a game today at Oklahoma.

Calipari got good playing time out of several newcomers, particularly freshman guard Edgar Padilla, who came off the bench against Carolina for 13 minutes of solid floor leadership. Freshman Marcus Camby had 6 points and 7 rebounds before exiting with a knee injury.

There's no telling how long Camby will be out, and the Minutemen will have to adjust to life without him. He was sorely missed Friday against Kansas, which goes 10 deep and placed six scorers in double figures.

UMass is one of four teams being considered to play Kentucky in the 1994 Hall of Fame Tip-Off Classic at the Springfield Civic Center.

"We try to have two teams that project to be among the top 10-15 teams in the country," a tournament spokeman said. "We feel Kentucky is a good choice, especially with Rick Pitino coaching."

A decision is expected in the next two weeks.

Bob Monahan of the Globe staff contributed to this report.