It seems like every year the usual suspects are lined up as contenders for the best basketball conference in the country.
Big East. ACC. Pac-10. Big Ten.
But the Big 12 never seems to get much love, despite some impressive numbers that suggest the newest of the major conferences deserve to be part of the conversation. No conference has advanced more teams to Elite Eight (13) and Final Four (six) since 2002. The Kansas Jayhawks even cut down the nets in 2008.
The Kansas Jayhawks are the No.1 choice almost every preseason basketball publication, now they are also the unanimous pick to win the Big 12 championship by the league coaches, according to the poll released Wednesday.
The Jayhawks, who return all five starters and pretty much all of their scoring from a season ago, received all 11 possible first-place votes by the Big 12 coaches (head coaches can not vote for their own team). In addition to the retuning starters, which include All-Big 12 First Team selections Sherron Collins and Cole Aldrich, Kansas also brings aboard one of the top recruiting classes in the nation.Collins and Aldrich have also been selected the preseason co-Players of the Year.
The debate about which conference is the best basketball league usually heats up in December.
But the Big 12 coaches set fire to the debate early by staking claim as the best basketball conference Tuesday, some five months before the 2009-10 season begins. So the Big East, ACC, Pac-10 and SEC will have to just lineup for second best.
"I do think it's going to be the best with what we have retuning and the things that we've done in the last few years," Texas A&M coach Mark Turgeon said during the Big 12 summer teleconference call Tuesday. "I've talked to some so-called experts out there and they think we are going to be the best league, too.
We're about an hour and a half from the first tip of this year's NCAA Tournament, so what better time to remember why we love the damn thing so much in the first place.
Those of you rooting for Belmont to take out the second-seeded Blue Devils this evening, remember, it can happen. Just watch Tarvis Williams beat Iowa State with seven seconds to play to send Hampton to the second round. And even among non-Belmont backers, there's probably a fair number who would like to see Greg Paulus muff an easy one the way Jamaal Tinsley did in 2001.
Texas does not like to make it easy on itself, even as they improve to 6-2 in the Big 12. In eight conference games the Longhorns have trailed at the half in 5 of them, including all of the past 4. Despite that, they have only lost once in those games. as they pulled out an overtime road win over Iowa State, 71-65.
This time, they had to make a late comeback as the Longhorns were down by 11 with a little more than 10 minutes left and not even 40 points scored at that point. Texas proceeded to outscore Iowa State 25-14, as the Texas defense surged to take away everything inside for the Cyclones.
Jiri Hubalek, who had 22 points in the first 30 minutes for Iowa State, only had 2 for the rest of the game and overtime. Hubalek was completely shut down because the Cyclones could not get him the ball. Hubalek had only one shot attempt in that time.
A.J. Abrams was the big scorer for Texas with 25, via 7-10 on 3s. The rest of the Longhorns were 1-11 outside the perimeter. Texas has to be concerned about the way they play in the first half. They have lacked intensity and focus. Settling for jump shots and only putting defensive effort in spurts.
They may keep winning, but they are forced to play D.J. Augustin and A.J. Abrams huge minutes to do it. Augustin has played 38 minutes or more in all of the conference games and except for one game, the same situation is with Abrams. Both have averaged around 36 minutes for the season. That has to take a toll.
Yes, Kansas still is dominant in the conference. That is probably the one constant in the Big 12 this season. That and Oklahoma State still can't win a road game. Everything else is up for debate.
Last week, I noted that the Big 12 is a difficult conference to notch road wins. Naturally the road teams went 5-7 this past week to make things a little less skewed. Considering the road teams had won 5 games all season until last week, that was a huge swing.
Having a bad week: Missouri and Oklahoma State. Suspensions and extended losing streaks taking the hope out of the fans.
Having a good week: Oklahoma and K-State. Blake Griffin back much earlier than expected to help the Sooners win two big games, and the Wildcats are undefeated in the conference to make tonight's meeting with Kansas that much more dramatic.
Kansas came into conference play as clearly the best team. They've done nothing to dispel that notion. Not that teams aren't trying.
Baylor and K-State have started strong. Texas is always hanging about. Iowa State has gotten off to a nice start. Then it starts getting dicey. The Big 12 is the second toughest major conference to get a road win with the home teams going 13-5 (.722). Only the Big East at .778 (35-10) is tougher. There's going to be a lot of teams struggling to finish 8-8 in conference. Making it difficult for any of the other teams to stay close to the Jayhawks.
I've already voiced my displeasure with the inclusion of teams like Xavier among the mid-major morass. They have the tradition, the size and the talent to hang with any of the big boys but the Atlantic 10 is still a bit of a redheaded stepchild. The only way they can defy their label is by winning games, something they've done seven out of eight times this season after beating Creighton 79-66 last night. The deep Musketeers got a typically well-balanced scoring night, led by 28 from Drew Lavender. The 5-7 sparkplug usually finds one of his five teammates who score in double figures but took matters into his own hands from the opening tip. He scored 17 in the first half, hit four threes and still found the time to dish out 10 assists.
XU remains under the radar but is a team that can't be slept on. C.J. Anderson, Josh Duncan and Derrick Brown can beat you inside while Lavender, Stanley Burrell and B.J. Raymond control the perimeter. Few teams, regardless of conference, can match that kind of balanced scoring. We'll see who among Tennessee, Kansas State, Auburn, Virginia and Arizona State can, but first the Musketeers will face Cincinnati in a battle for city bragging rights next week.
Here's a hilarious clip from the 1992 NCAA Tournament Selection show when then-Iowa State coach Johnny Orr tells Dick Vitale what most of us think pretty much every time we see his mug on television:
According to Wikipedia, "Orr led Iowa State to [five] NCAA tournament berths before retiring from Iowa State in 1994. He remains the winningest coach in Iowa State history with 218 wins and 200 losses." Next to Vitale is Jim Valvano, probably one of the ACC's most charismatic coaches.
Where: Oklahoma City Defending Champions: Kansas Favorites: Kansas, Texas A&M and Texas
Dark Horse: Texas Tech
Storylines: Can Kansas make it to the championship game on Sunday and lock up a #1 seed? Can Kansas State or Texas Tech make a deep enough run (which will likely require winning the matchup against each other in the quarterfinals) to get off the bubble and into the Big Dance? Will Acie Law IV channel Randolph Childress circa 1995 and cary A&M to the title?
Best Potential Games: Kansas State vs. Texas Tech in the quarterfinals and Kansas vs. Texas A&M or Texas in the championship game.
Random Thoughts: The Big XII tournament always seems to be somewhat of a wild ride with more upsets than the other major tournaments, it's very rare the "chalk" holds up. Seeing Oklahoma State make it to Sunday, for example, wouldn't surprise me in the least. For total entertainment value, the Big XII tournament is second only to the ACC for me. This year does feature 3 heavy favorites and "everyone else" - but if one of the big 3 goes down early on this could get crazy in a hurry.
NCAA Basketball iowa state Cyclones 
The Kansas Jayhawks are the No.1 choice almost every preseason basketball publication, now they are also the unanimous pick to win the Big 12 championship by the league coaches, according to the poll released Wednesday..jpg)
The debate about which conference is the best basketball league usually heats up in December.
Texas does not like to make it easy on itself, even as they improve to 6-2 in the Big 12. In eight conference games the Longhorns have trailed at the half in 5 of them, including all of the past 4. Despite that, they have only lost once in those games. as they pulled out an overtime road win over Iowa State, 71-65.
I've already voiced my displeasure with the inclusion of teams like Xavier among the mid-major morass. They have the tradition, the size and the talent to hang with any of the big boys but the Atlantic 10 is still a bit of a redheaded stepchild. The only way they can defy their label is by winning games, something they've done seven out of eight times this season after beating Creighton 79-66 last night. The deep Musketeers got a typically well-balanced scoring night, led by 28 from Drew Lavender. The 5-7 sparkplug usually finds one of his five teammates who score in double figures but took matters into his own hands from the opening tip. He scored 17 in the first half, hit four threes and still found the time to dish out 10 assists. 
