Kansas basketball coach Bill Self reacts to loss on road at Arizona
Check out everything Kansas basketball coach Bill Self had to say Saturday following a road loss in Big 12 Conference play against Arizona.
LAWRENCE — Kansas basketball battled a pair of highly ranked teams during the past week, and after splitting those games is now ranked No. 15 in Monday’s update of the USA TODAY Sports Coaches Poll.
The Jayhawks (21-8, 11-5 in Big 12) beat now-No. 6 Houston at home and lost to now-No. 2 Arizona on the road. Those outcomes caused Kansas to drop one spot from No. 14 last week. This week, KU will face Arizona State on Tuesday on the road and Kansas State on Saturday at home.
The Big 12 also features No. 7 Iowa State and No. 10 Texas Tech. If Kansas is going to face any of those ranked teams again this season, it’ll be in either the Big 12 tournament or the NCAA tournament. How these games play out this week will make the final determinations for how the Big 12 tournament picture sets up for the Jayhawks.
Kansas enters these two games still with an apparent need to continue to develop chemistry with freshman Darryn Peterson on the floor consistently, considering the time he’s missed this season. Do that, and the Jayhawks will have the opportunity to make runs in both postseason events. Come up short, and KU likely won’t be able to reach the heights it could have been capable of coming into the season.
Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. He was the 2022 National Sports Media Association’s sportswriter of the year for the state of Kansas. Contact him at jmguskey@gannett.com or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey.
