X, Man!

Hoo boy.

It just seemed too good to be true, but as with so many Bill Self recruiting stories, the best-case scenario has come to pass. Xavier Henry's a Jayhawk -- as is C.J. apparently.

If we were the 2010 pre-season #1 already, now we're ... well, put it this way -- no one else is even worthy of #2.

Depending on which list you look at, X may be the biggest Kansas recruit since Manning. (Don't hold me to that, but that's an educated guess. Julian, Nick, Paul and Raef were big recruits, but were any of them ranked as high as #3 in their class?)

But even if X doesn't turn out to be the second coming, that's OK. This team is so loaded, he doesn't need to be. He'll have his ups and downs like any freshman, but if he can just average double figures -- and believe me, if you've seen this kid's jump shot, he can -- that should be enough to put us over the top.

This gives Kansas the holy trinity of great players that most championship teams must have -- guard, wing, big man.

Kansas 2010: Collins, Henry, Aldrich
Carolina 2009: Lawson, Ellington, Hansbrough
Kansas 2008: Chalmers/Collins, Rush, Arthur
Florida 2006-7: Green, Brewer, Noah/Horford
Carolina 2005: Felton, McCants, May
Syracuse 2003: McNamara, Anthony, Warrick
Duke 2001: Williams, Dunleavy, Boozer
Duke 1991-2: Hurley, Hill, Laettner
Kansas 1988: Pritchard, Newton, Manning

Scott, we haven't heard from you in a while... Thoughts? I'm genuinely sorry that so many of KU's recent successes seem to come at Memphis's expense...

I'm Back, Baby!

But more importantly, so are Cole and Sherron.



Here's some video on the announcement.

So, are we #1?

And, this kind of puts all that hand wringing about Xavier/Cal/Lance in perspective.

Here We Go

Finally the wait is over. The good news is rolling in--someday we'll look back on April 3rd as a historic day, the day that the Iowa Supreme Court finally did the right thing and
...
in an unrelated story, the day that the AP named Bill Self national coach of the year.

Congrats, coach!

Hell of a year. Hell of a year!


And in other news, although there's no word from Stephenson, Xavier Henry wants to be a Jayhawk, according to his father.

It's a good day to be an American, and a good day to be a Jayhawk.

Rock Chalk!

Gone To Seed

Chris texted me to say this was one of the least disappointing of KU's tourney exits, and I would have to agree. After all, we played to seed; we met or exceeded expectations for the year; and we made a heroic effort against the Spartans.

What hurts is that this was a winnable game, and we seemed to be the better team. Cole and Sherron were near-unstoppable, Brady and Tyrell had some nice moments, and we played with great aggression on both ends of the court. But we were undone by some of the usual problems -- turnovers, lack of scoring balance, poor shot selection by our freshmen. And credit to MSU for making some big, timely baskets and stops.

(What also hurts, by the way, is being outdone by Mizzou. When was the last time they advanced further than Kansas? Early '90s?)

Interesting turning point here. It feels to me -- and this is just an instinct -- that if we had pulled this one out we would have definitely seen Cole and/or Sherron bolt for the pros regardless of what happened in the next round. The two of them played like superstars, esp. in the first half. The hype on them if we had won this game would have been blinding. But since we lost, maybe not so much.

If those guys are back, we're a Final Four favorite in 2010. If they're back and Lance Stephenson commits, we're the favorite for the national title.

Anything Mizzou Can Do...

I'm still sort of in shock that the MU Tigers beat the MU Tigers last night -- at least that they did it so convincingly. I've seen Mizzou play well this year, but nowhere near THAT well. Sorry, Scott, but at least it's a boon to the Big 12. Can KU and OU follow suit?

Also glad, of course, to see the Devils go down in flames. Duke's now-customary comeuppance has become my second favorite event in the tourney every year, next to any KU win.

I've been going back and forth on this MSU game. They have the much more balanced and experienced team. It's an even match statistically, although they rebound better than us. Defensively, it's a little scary to consider their big men doing to Cole what we did to Hansbrough last year -- and MSU's Travis Walton spending day and night studying Sherron like an FBI profiler.

But ... we have the revenge factor, which is always a big psychological advantage, as is the underdog status, which we so rarely get to enjoy as Kansas fans. Even more important, they haven't played anyone as good as us ... ever since they did play us way back when. And it is a scientific fact that the Big 10 sucks this season.

So... OK, that settles it. 'Hawks by 5!

Will he stay or will he go?

There's a nice article about Sherron on espn.com. If we somehow make it back into the final four this year is it likely that Sherron will go? Surprisingly the article says that Sherron is going to leave it up to Self to decide. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Self will want Sherron to head the team for sure next year. If we can hang on to Aldrich and Sherron we will be, with out question, one of the most dominate teams in the nation. Who knows how things will work out though. I think we actually turned into a better all around team having lost Julian a couple years ago. But I think the case is very different wit Sherron. I don't know if you could really fault Sherron for going but I think he could be even better if he waited one more year. Is everybody too focused on Friday to care about this issue yet? Thoughts?

No-Fly Zone

I had my doubts going into the weekend, but it's on to the Sweet 16 once again.

Cole snags the triple-double and becomes immortalized in tourney history. That had to be the most dominant individual tourney performance for KU at least since Collison against Duke in '03.

Sherron was nearly as good; Keegan has a good column (can't believe I just said that) in which Self really sings Sherron's praises -- an interesting counterpoint in a year when a lot of KU observers (including myself) have been quick to criticize him.

I have to admit, as Coach Self did, we were lucky that Dayton was terrible offensively. There were a lot of stretches when the 'Hawks went cold and the Flyers had a chance to build some momentum, but they just seemed to self-destruct on the offensive end. Their wing players were kamikazes, repeatedly driving right at Cole and getting it sent back every single time.... and then doing it again. But give our defense just a little credit as well -- Dayton had no problem against supposed defensive juggernaut West Virginia the other day.

The biggest concern now: Have we become too much of a two-man show? By my count, the dynamic duo scored 93 of Kansas's 144 points over the weekend. Mario, Tyrel and Marcus had some nice moments here and there, but that consistent third option has never materialized. Does it need to?

I think I just smiled at him

Is there some way both versions could be right? Please?

From kusports.com:
One of Collins’ misses was put back hard by Aldrich, who dunked, was fouled and hit a free throw, upping a 73-67 lead to 76-67 with 1:53 left.

KU’s team leaders and fast friends — Collins said they have hung out off the court together a lot more this season than last — visited on the court after that bucket.

“I told him, ‘That’s how you go up and dunk. That’s how you finish at the rim. He whispered in my ear, ‘Da da da, da da da,’’’ Collins added, singing the theme song from ESPN’s SportsCenter.

Aldrich’s version?

“He always says some of the goofiest things,” he said of Collins. “He said, ‘Good follow (shot), way to go crash the boards.’ I think I just smiled at him.”


So it is indeed the Flyers for us tomorrow. Thoughts? I feel confident about our ability, and yesterday can't but be good for the team.

Death March To Minny?

There's a lot of fear and trembling in Jayhawk-land going into the tourney this year. Everyone seems to agree that the Midwest is the toughest bracket, and that the 'Hawks are ripe for an upset.

Keegan says we have no chance (although he's doing it to try to reverse-jinx our boys). Fox Sports puts N. Dakota St. on their list of Cinderellas and Kansas on their list of likely early exits. The Wall Street Journal also envisions a possible first-round upset. Joe Lunardi has us losing to West Virginia. CBS Sportsline's Doyel has us losing to Dayton. One notable exception is the KC Star's Upon Further Review blog, which puts us in the Final Four -- but I can't tell if they're being facetious.

The good thing about all of this is that the fashionable upset picks often don't materialize -- and it obviously provides good bulletin board material for our players. But I'm not going to ignore the evidence; NDSU is exactly the type of team best suited to beat us: deadly outside shooting, packed with 5th-year seniors who have won games against major conference competition, and headed by a major game-breaker on the offensive end, Ben Woodside, who seems an excellent candidate to pull another Voskuil (Texas Tech) on us. Plus once again the committee has set us up for a road game -- Minneapolis is just a few hours away from NDSU's campus.

The KC Star's statistical breakdown gives NDSU the advantage over KU in 10 of 15 categories. The one good thing here, though, is that even with our much stronger strength of schedule, we're a lot better than they are in one very important category -- FG percentage defense. Soooo... if we can just keep the unforced turnovers to a minimum and get out on their shooters, we should be OK. I think. (shudder)

Big 12 Blog-a-thon

And we're off...

Anyone catch Texas Tech's comeback against the Aggies last night? Sort of takes the curse off of our loss in Lubbock, but wow, I've never seen a team look as flummoxed as Turgeon and co. at the end of that game. Does this lock them out of the Dance for sure?

KU-Baylor is T-minus 80 minutes -- I'll be furtively following it at the office.

I hope you're all on board, and online, for the rest of our 2009 run.