Very good win for KU in the rivalry game with Mizzou last night. Given how bad Mizzou has been on the road this year, it's just about the result I expected, although I did not think the game would be that high scoring. Although they played hard and were fairly impressive in the first half, Mizzou definitely lived up to the billing of their defense being 180 degrees worse on the road from how they play at home. They couldn't handle KU inside and were slow on following ball rotations, although I must admit KU looks like they are the best team in the nation at rotating the basketball... and that isn't being biased, that's just a fact.
This game brought the question to my mind of who exactly is the 3rd best team in the Big 12? Is there one? Currently, Baylor is in 3rd place, with a conference record of 5-4, every team below them has a worse conference record than that. Not very impressive. Is it K-State? Is is still Mizzou? Is it A&M or OSU? Hell, is it OU or Colorado? It looks like the only teams we know it's not are Texas Tech and Iowa State. Hard to tell, as all of these teams have had equally bad losses against each other and no truly impressive wins. It's like a revolving door.
Oh well, as long as KU and/or Texas have some degree of success in the tournament, no one will remember how mediocre their conference was. My personal opinion has always been to not worry that much about where the Big 12 standings fall anyways. Sure, it's nice to win the Big 12 several times in a row, but the first thing that comes to everyone's mind is how many National Championships you've won in the stretch.
So, KU certainly needs to focus on every game, taking them one at a time as Coach Self would say. But personally, as fans, I think it's OK for us to start putting our eye on the big prize of the National Championship. The tournament is right around the corner.
1) Texas
ReplyDelete2) KU
3) Mizzou
4) Texas A&M
5) Baylor
6) K-state (this is pre-Kelly maybe getting kicked off the team, if that's true they drop a couple spots)
7) Colorado
8) Oklahoma State
9) Nebraska
10) Oklahoma
11) Iowa State
12) Texas Tech
that's what i think at this point, a lot could change even in the next week
I think it's too soon to be thinking national championship for this team, i just don't see enough defense, we struggle with post defense and against quick guards who can drive the lane we will have to outscore people to make the final four and that's usually a recipe for an upset...having said that I do believe this team has the ability, experience and talent to win the title, i just feel like at this time the race with texas for the big 12 title is going to be very good and that's what i think most fans are thinking about