There isn’t a major conference in contemporary college sports that has been as thoroughly dominated by one program as Kansas has dominated Big 12 basketball. The Jayhawks have won the Big 12 regular season title for 10 straight years, which is the third longest streak in D1 history. The only programs to do it longer are Gonzaga in a mid-major and UCLA in the ‘60 and ‘70s. When you’re stacking up next to John Wooden, Lew Alcindor and Bill Walton, you must be doing something right.
The Big 12 is looking like the best basketball conference in the country
Is this the year someone finally dethrones Kansas in the Big 12? With as many as eight contenders, the Jayhawks will have their toughest test yet.
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Ricky O'Donnell has covered basketball at all levels for more than a decade at SB Nation. He’s currently the Associate Director of Programming.
During the streak, Bill Self has led Kansas to one national championship, another Final Four, an Elite 8 and two Sweet 16s. Kansas is right there with the most successful programs of the modern era, and Self’s ability to do it without ever suffering a down year is what really stands out. Even Kentucky missed the tournament in 2013 under John Calipari. Self’s teams have never seen a season end to Robert Morris in the N.I.T.
Coming into this season, it looked like Kansas had all the pieces to make a run at conference title No. 11. The Jayhawks lost the No. 1 (Andrew Wiggins) and No. 3 (Joel Embiid) overall NBA draft picks from last year's team, but added blue chip recruits at the same positions in Cliff Alexander and Kelly Oubre. With efficient scoring forward Perry Ellis returning for his junior year and Wayne Selden coming back for his sophomore year, it looked like Kansas was set.
Just days into conference play, this no longer appears to be a safe assumption. It’s not all about the Jayhawks, either. Through 14 games, Kansas has only lost to Kentucky (who beats everyone) and at Temple. Kansas already has a bunch of quality wins, too, from Tennessee to Michigan State to Florida to Georgetown to Utah. If Kansas isn’t winning the Big 12 for the 11th straight year, it’s only because this is the deepest and strongest conference in college basketball.
When the new polls came out this week, six of the 10 teams in the Big 12 were included in the top 25. Two more (11-2 Oklahoma State and 13-1 TCU) could have conceivably made a case to be there, too. The Big 12 conference slate is going to be really high quality basketball with multiple teams capable of making deep runs in the NCAA Tournament. You shouldn’t really need any other reason than that to pay attention.
Monday's slate featured two serious challengers to Kansas' throne going head to head when Texas hosted Oklahoma. With star guard Isaiah Taylor playing for the Longhorns for the first time since Nov. 20, it looked like a great matchup on paper. Unfortunately, only one team showed up to play.
Oklahoma looked incredible in a 70-49 victory, opening up a 19-point first half lead and never looking back. They zipped the ball around between their three starting guards, led by 13 points from Buddy Hield. On the inside, Ryan Spangler and TaShawn Thomas were able to out-rebound Texas' supersized front line.
Oklahoma has a real shot at the league crown this year thanks to three veteran guards and two big men added via transfer. Thomas, a transfer from Houston, is the more highly-touted of the two, and he gives the Sooners the type of inside-out game the team has historically lacked under Lon Kruger.
Texas didn’t show up in the first half on Monday, but they’re still a hell of a team. If anyone is going to give Kentucky or Duke a run for their money, the Longhorns are a safe bet. Texas already hung with Kentucky for most of the game a few weeks back without Taylor. With him, they have a quick, probing point guard and the type of size most schools won’t be able to match up with. Texas will be a factor in March, even if they didn’t look like one on Monday.
Iowa State will be, too. Fred Hoiberg might have his best team in his fifth season with the Cyclones, which is incredible considering last year's squad had DeAndre Kane and Big 12 Player of the Year Melvin Ejim. This year's team revolves around Georges Niang, who is turning in another outstanding all-around offensive season while shooting 49.2 percent from the field.
What could make this Cyclones team different from the ones the last few years is that Hoiberg finally has a legitimate shot blocker now in transfer Jameel McKay. McKay is a springy athlete at 6'9, 215 pounds, and has looked good in his first three games since becoming eligible this season. With a great pure point guard in Monte Morris (6:1 assist-to-turnover ratio), a shooter in Naz Long and a dynamic combo guard in Bryce Dejean-Jones, Iowa State is going to give a lot of teams trouble.
West Virginia is the forgotten team in the Big 12 mix, but Bob Huggins' squad is likely to be a terror in conference play. With an attacking defensive style and one of the best lead guards in the country in Juwan Staten, a matchup with the Mountaineers is always going to be a pain. Transfer Jonathan Holton (6'7, 220 pounds) and sophomore forward Devin Williams (6'9, 255 pounds) gives Bob Huggins a pair of huge athletes who know how to get their own offense, while role players like Jaysean Paige and Gary Browne have added reliable perimeter shooting.
It’s working out well so far: West Virginia’s only loss came to LSU by one point.
No. 21 Baylor, TCU and Oklahoma State might not have as much firepower as the other five teams, but they add great depth to the conference.
College basketball season is always designed to focus exclusively on March Madness, but the conference season is enjoyable too when you have a league as deep as this year’s Big 12. The ACC is going to be great as well but that 15-team monstrosity is a beast unto itself. The Big 12 is a throwback conference in the sense that every team plays home and away. With so many solid teams in the league this year and Kansas’ dominance hanging over everything, the competition in the Big 12 is looking like a real reason to care about conference play.
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