Kansas Jayhawks basketball’s main issue vs. Oklahoma Sooners — and how Self can help

Step back from the craziness of Kansas basketball’s 71-69 home win over Oklahoma on Saturday, and a troubling trend for KU is re-emerging.

A week ago, the Jayhawks seemed to recapture some defensive dominance in consecutive wins over Iowa State and Baylor. Finally, the vaunted Bill Self defense of years past seemed to be making an appearance — or, at the very least, rising to a respectable-enough level that would turn this team back into a Final Four contender.

That already seems like long ago. On Saturday, KU barely survived against Oklahoma at Allen Fieldhouse, doing that only because its offense was terrific again.

The Jayhawks nearly lost another one defensively. And in a slow-paced game, they allowed 1.11 points per possession to Oklahoma — the Sooners’ second-best offensive mark in their 11 Big 12 games. That was after Texas put up 1.15 PPP in KU’s road loss Monday.

One could point blame in a lot of different directions against Oklahoma. KU didn’t effectively guard pick-and-pops against 5-man Tanner Groves, with KU’s big men getting back to him a step late too often. The Jayhawks guards could also shoulder responsibility in the first half, allowing the Sooners too many opportunities off straight-line drives.

A bigger-picture issue, though, is haunting the Jayhawks, and it’s something that Self can control quite a bit.

KU simply isn’t creating havoc on the defensive end, and never was that more evident than against an Oklahoma offense on Saturday that came in as one of the Big 12’s most careless teams.

The Sooners entered 338th nationally in offensive turnover rate and had 12% of their possessions end in opponent steals — a bottom-10 mark in Div. I. That mixed with Allen Fieldhouse’s craziness seemed like a potential recipe for disaster.

Instead ... Oklahoma went its first 16 possessions without a turnover in building an early lead. The Sooners finished the game giving it away 15% of their possessions, their fourth-best mark of the entire season.

Self historically has built his best defenses by playing in the correct positions and forcing teams into tough shots. Still, there can be a happy medium too. There’s nothing wrong with heating things up defensively to get a few more turnovers or steals, especially with the Jayhawks showing themselves to be so potent in transition this season.

So what can Self do? Advanced numbers indicate a change in the rotation could help fix a few problems at once.

One must be careful making too many grand conclusions from lineup data because samples are small. Recognizing that, though ... Self often refers to his team’s plus-minus data after games, and opponent-adjusted lineup numbers also can help us see through some of the noise too.

The stats at EvanMiya.com give the best look, as the lineup numbers factor in both a player’s teammates and the difficulty of the opposition he’s going against.

A quick search of KU’s best two-person lineups — heading into Saturday — tells an interesting story. Here are KU’s five-best two-person combos when it comes to overall adjusted efficiency margin, minimum 100 possessions together.

Yes, the sample size needs to be larger to draw more definitive assertions. But notice second place and fourth place on the list are represented by KU’s two-small-guard lineups.

Things don’t change much when we look at KU’s best two-person defensive combos either.

One of Self’s great excitements about his offseason additions was the ability to play two combo guards together — a playing style that many of his best teams have shared.

Over time, though, doing that this season has been pushed a bit to the back burner. Remy Martin has been in and out with his knee injury, while Joseph Yesufu has only gained Self’s confidence in recent weeks.

While it would seem natural that playing two small guards together would help KU’s offense, and with potentially playing faster, the numbers appear to indicate that it could be just as beneficial for the defense as well.

Because without two small guards in, KU tends to play more passively. While Harris can be disruptive, his impact appears limited when there isn’t someone else out there helping to get after the opponent.

This seems like an area where Yesufu and Martin — and also Self — can potentially help.

Self, from the preseason, has called Yesufu one of KU’s best on-ball defenders. He’s shown that in recent games as well, posting four steals in the Jayhawks’ previous three games before playing just four minutes against Oklahoma on Saturday.

Playing a two-small-guard lineup can be tricky at times. There are more possibilities for opponents to post up the short guys, and defensive rebounding can be a more significant challenge too.

But the larger point here is that turnovers are a huge factor on defense. And creating just a few more of those can do more than make up for other worries that KU might be creating for itself with the setup.

In 11 Big 12 games, the Jayhawks have created opponent turnovers on 15.4% of possessions. If that stands, it’ll be the lowest mark by a Self KU team in any of his 19 seasons in Lawrence.

Self has been looking for a way this season to get star Ochai Agbaji and other starters more rest. In addition, he’s searching for more consistency from his bench and wanting more from his team defensively.

One change seems like the path to helping all that: Self needs to go back to trusting his two-combo-guard lineups — starting with Yesufu-Harris before Martin comes back — a lot more often than he’s doing now.

So far, that arrangement has done more than help KU’s offense.

It’s also been a part of KU playing its best defense as well.

This story was originally published February 12, 2022 at 6:06 PM.

Jesse Newell

The Kansas City Star

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Jesse Newell covered the Chiefs for The Star until August 2025. He won an EPPY for best sports blog and previously was named top beat writer in his circulation by AP’s Sports Editors. His interest in sports analytics comes from his math teacher father, who handed out rulers to Trick-or-Treaters each year.