KU hoops’ Bill Self assesses Big 12 regular season: ‘It’s going to be a monster’
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Bill Self warns Big 12 will be brutal as KU begins 18-game conference slate
- KU faces tough tests including UCF, West Virginia and Iowa State
- KenPom ranks KU’s schedule 13th; Self cites repeated matches with top teams
After winning 10 of 13 games in the nonconference portion of the 2025-26 men’s basketball season, the No. 17-ranked Kansas Jayhawks are now preparing to tackle a marathon Big 12 schedule.
“First season is over, second season starts and we need to get off to a good start unlike last year,” Bill Self, KU’s 23-year coach, said of Saturday’s Big 12 opener against UCF (11-1).
“Last year, West Virginia came in and got us the first game. So we need to take the show on the road and go play well down there,”
Tipoff for Saturday’s KU-UCF game is 1 p.m. Central Time at Addition Financial Arena in Orlando. The game will be shown live from Florida on Peacock.
The Jayhawks (10-3), who went 11-9 in league play a year ago, opened the 2024-25 campaign with a shocking 62-61 loss to West Virginia on Dec. 31, 2025 at Allen Fieldhouse. The defeat ended KU’s 33-game win streak in conference openers, a run dating to the 1991-92 season.
West Virginia (10-10) wound up tying Baylor (10-10) for seventh in the league standings. KU’s two-games-over-.500 mark was good for sixth place, which is where the league coaches have picked the Jayhawks to finish again this season.
Self, who has led KU to 16 league titles in 22 seasons including an NCAA-record tying 13 conference crowns in a row (2005-17), expects hard-fought games each and every night.
“It’s going to be a monster,” Self said of the Big 12, which has cut its schedule from 20 to 18 games in 2025-26. “Any win is going to be a good win, regardless of where it is. Certainly, road will be harder than home, but they’re all going to be hard games.”
Self noted that, “During the years that we won the league, I always thought, ‘If you’re good enough to win the Big 12, you’re one of the best teams in the country.’
“Now I think, ‘If you’re good enough to finish in the top four or five in the Big 12, you’re one of the best teams in the country.’ There’s a good chance a team that could finish fourth in our league could win a national championship and certainly make a Final Four. So it’s a hard path, but it’ll be good for everybody. It should be fun for the fans too.”
Six Big 12 squad are ranked among the nation’s top 17 teams in the final AP poll of the nonconference part of the 2025-26 season.
Arizona, unbeaten at 13-0, is ranked No. 1 and Iowa State (also 13-0) is ranked No. 3. Houston and BYU, a pair of 12-1 teams, rank Nos. 8 and 10, respectively, giving the Big 12 four teams in the current top 10. Texas Tech is ranked No. 15 at 10-3, followed by Kansas at No. 17.
Baylor (10-2), Oklahoma State (12-1), UCF (11-1) and Arizona State (9-4) made the “others receiving votes” category.
Six Big 12 teams are not mentioned in the latest AP poll, though all have winning records: Colorado (10-3), TCU (10-3), West Virginia (9-4), Kansas State (9-4), Utah (8-4) and Cincinnati (8-5).
“When you look at the top part of it, and I haven’t thought this through, but you’ve got, without question, the preseason No. 1 team, Houston,” Self said. “The only reason that they’re not in the top five right now is because they’ve lost, what, one game?
“The game they lost was to Tennessee (76-73 in the Players Era tournament at Las Vegas) in what, a one-possession game? They can win a national championship, and Arizona can for sure win a national championship. Iowa State could, for sure, win a national championship.
“BYU … they’re going to be in the game to play for a national championship and Texas Tech hasn’t been healthy yet, and they’re ranked 15th in the country, and they’ve got probably the two best offensive players on the same team, hands down, in (JT) Toppin and (Christian) Anderson. Maybe (AJ) Dybantsa and (Richie) Saunders at BYU would probably be the only other pair to compete with that.”
Self said the Big 12 is not only “top heavy” this season, but “middle heavy,” as well.
“UCF, Oklahoma State, West Virginia, K-State and there’s obviously more,” Self said. “TCU has beaten Florida (84-80),” he added of the defending national champs. “From a coach’s standpoint, it’s a situation (where) every game is a tough game.”
In the 16-team league, every team will play three other teams twice and 12 teams once to equal 18 games.
“When you think about it, we play three teams twice — one will be K-State every year, which is always hard. They’ve beaten us the last three times over there,” Self said of KSU and its home court at Bramlage Coliseum in Manhattan. “The other two we play twice … the No. 1 team, Arizona, and No. 3 Iowa State.
“We’re playing them twice, where other people don’t have to play those same teams twice. So even though it’s hard, our schedule probably is as hard as anyone’s, when you talk about playing the top of the league.”
Asked how confident he is that his Jayhawks will have a successful showing in league play, Self said: “You have to define success. I think we’ll get better. I think we’ll have a good year. It’s a hard schedule. Our (strength of schedule) will be one, two or three, when all is said and done.”
KU’s schedule as of Monday was rated No. 13 in the country by Kenpom.com.
The Jayhawks will play UCF on the road Saturday, then return home to meet TCU on Tuesday, Jan. 6, followed by another road game at West Virginia on Jan. 10.
