BPI #5 Ranking ↗ | RPI #1 Ranking ↗

!TEAM ↗

The Day After: Iowa State ↗

As it turns out, road losses in tough environments like Colorado and Florida may have paid off for the Kansas University men's basketball team, which went into arguably the toughest place to play on its entire schedule Monday night — Hilton Coliseum — and knocked off Iowa State, 77-70.

Newell: Recap: Examining Joel Embiid's hidden impact against Iowa State ↗

According to SCACChoops.com, ISU made just 17 of 35 dunk and layup attempts (48.5 percent), and that was after entering the game as the fifth-best close shooting team in the nation (73.9 percent).

This hints that KU center Joel Embiid might have even had bigger impact than his stat line showed.

Keegan: Admit it; You’re starting to understand the fuss over Andrew Wiggins ↗

Even the creative Iowa State student hecklers armed with acidic tongues and strong spirits in Hilton Coliseum conceded as much Monday night as Wiggins covered so much space in the air, moved so quickly on the ground. He stunned them into silence.

Self's words spur Tharpe to big game against Iowa State ↗

It was Sunday, the day before Kansas’ road game at Iowa State, and point guard Naadir Tharpe was missing almost all of his jumpshots during practice.

KU coach Bill Self made sure to find his junior floor leader before Monday’s game.

!new jerseys ↗

Self: KU’s alternate uniforms will stick around ↗

It looks as if the alternate jerseys Kansas University’s basketball players have worn the last two games are turning into permanent jerseys ... at least for the remainder of the 2013-14 season.

“Because I personally, and our players personally, prefer those to what we have been wearing,” KU coach Bill Self said

ESPN: Joel Embiid can carry Kansas ↗

During Kansas’ preseason practices last October, the eyes of the spectators were locked onto a lanky new arrival.

By then, everyone had heard of Andrew Wiggins. But Joel Embiid was still somewhat of a mystery.

OUR DAILY THREADS:

• What is the deal with UK and Coach Cal?
• Is the OSU game a "trap game?"

Vote for KU here ↗

If KU wins they get 100K and if you vote you can win something. Don't ask me what. It was just an email I got and KU is losing (45th place) so I figured I'd draw up some votes for KU. Arkansas State is in the lead and we can't let those S.O.B. win!!!!

I highly recommend everyone read that last article on ESPN.... especially the comments section, in the middle... some tasty bantering between a UK fan and other fans. The UK fan believes Cauley-Stein is better than Embiid. Priceless delusion from the True Blues crowd.

I'm wondering out loud to you guys this question:

Honestly, how many of us for the first time in 25 years had doubt creep into their minds as to whether this team would make the tournament this year? Admittedly, I was probably more sensitive to the idea after watching UK fail last year. I'm glad I can wholeheartedly put that behind me now!!

@Blown Frankly, I was never worried about not making the tournament this year. Kentucky last year is an interesting comparison, but even when we struggled I considered our team this year superior to their team last year. And I know for sure our coach is superior, which is probably more important.

@Blown Gotta admit after the lethargic SDSU home loss, I thought we were at a real crossroad & that it could possibly all go South with a vacancy being a potential outcome. But in all honesty, UK has Cal, & he & Self should not even be referenced in the sentence, let alone same category. My bad!

I never thought we would be NIT-bound this year.

And when looking at Kentucky this year... if something happened to Randle right now, they could have a repeat year of failure in the NIT. Sure... they have loads of talent, but it is undeveloped for D1... Randle was the only guy truly D1 ready. Young is making big gains, however. I don't think they could rebound from a loss like Randle.

BTW: I'm not hoping that happens!

@drgnslayr I watched Stein play ball here in Jo Co & whoever thinks that has a propensity for sheer delusion. Granted I've not watched him much since HS ball, but pleeeeaaaaseeee? Maybe that UK fan was posting from the green, green, pastures of Colorado?!

There was maybe a three week stretch at the beginning of the season where I would have said Cauley-Stein looked better than Embiid. I think it was the "flat-top, no bleach" era (he's changed his hair like five times this season), but Embiid caught up pretty quickly and has left him in the dust since then. I wouldn't trade Embiid for any player in the country.

@Virgil_Caine Welcome back Virgil, hope things are great in Dixie. Hindsight is always perfect, but no way I'd trade Joel for anyone now. Aw, maybe Danny Manning in his prime, but Embid has the package that is a once in a lifetime jewel for most programs other than Kansas. He already has Olajuwon moves after playing only 3 years. His first step is roadrunner quick. And after all, The Big Dipper was as special as it's ever been anywhere. This kid will be special in the L too, barring a major debilitating injury. A Davis won the POY vs TRob a couple years back & IMO Joel is already hands above him in their freshman seasons-for sure on the offensive side.

@globaljaybird I saw Cauley (Stein) a few times too. The best player on the ONW team was Shavon Shields (now at Nebraska). Cauley was soft, didn't give effort, and was regularly handled by high school players that weren't close to D-1 talent. Two D-1 guys like that an no title. Heck, one year they got knocked out in sub-state.

@HighEliteMajor Very well stated HEM. For reasons of political correctness I didn't say that, but he was soft & I thought played only when he felt like it. Shields was all in when I saw him. I was totally surprised any of the power schools went after Stein, but then I only saw the snapshot-yet was not at all impressed. You've a much more tactful way of clarifying an opinion than I, my subtlety is somewhat lacking. I don't always take adequate time to explain myself at times, while on the contrary, it seems you always do.

@Blown I was not worried about making the tournament, but the thought that this was the year where our string of championships ended sure was at the top of my mind. I felt it was way too early to worry about the Dance. Plus, Self's track record speaks for itself...this team reminds me of the 2006 team but with higher end talent. When that team lost 2 of the first 3 in the conference.....I was worried at that time. Also, our 4 losses were teams that (at this time.......we'll see what Dinwiddie's injury does to CU) are tournament teams and you don't get penalized as much for losing to good teams.

Self's recruiting + comprehensive system of offense + defense simply = a better product/result on average (for the season) than all Div.1 opponents. Not talking about single-game results...See W/L leading stat over the past 6yrs running... Thus will not end up in the NIT as long as we have Bill Self.

@Blown

I have been saying all along to trust Coach Self and that once the players embrace his system KU would be OK. It looks like is tuning out exactly this way.