There are so many records in the making with this team, it's hard to keep track.
-- Sherron is now tied for winningest KU player ever (123) -- with Raef and his class of '98. Granted, this has something to do with the quality of Sherron's teammates over four years, and with the greater number of games that are scheduled these days, but still... Wow. (The media has been including Brady in this milestone, but this blog does not recognize Brady's redshirt season as part of the win total.)
-- Anyway, never mind that. Ten more wins puts Sherron in a tie with Battier and Duke's class of '01 for winningest college player ever. EVER!
-- Sherron has also become one of only three players in KU history with at least 1,700 points and 500 assists. The others are Hinrich and Darnell Valentine.
-- Cole already has the single season Kansas record for blocks -- the first KU player with more than 100 in a season -- and is on track to pass Poster-tag for the all-time KU record in only his junior year. (* It does have to be mentioned, as always, that this stat was not kept in Wilt's day.)
-- Kansas is five away from its all-time home winning streak of 62. Unfortunately we can't catch that one this year -- unless we turn down our NCAA bid in favor of the NIT. Probably not worth it.
-- The other day, Yancy asked how many teams have won six conference titles in a row. The LJW reports that Kansas would be the first BCS team to win that many conference titles in a row since UCLA '67-79. Holy shit! Can you say JUGGERNAUT?
-- As we discussed earlier, Kansas has a chance to become the first team to win the title with only one loss since the mid-1970s. If this milestone is achieved, Chris and I will have been proven very, very wrong. And happily so.
-- *Edit... I can't believe I initally forgot this, but it's the most important one of all: total program wins. The University of Kansas is now only 4 wins shy of 2,000, which only the tainted Kentucky program has reached so far. And... and... AND... WAIT FOR IT....
-- At the same time, KU is now only two games behind UNC for second place in the overall wins race. Along with Bill Self, the two coaches most responsible for this achievement are: Current UNC coach Roy Williams, whose team has been in an unbelievable tailspin this season; and former Kansas coach... Roy Williams, without whose incredible 80% winning proficiency from '89 to '03 Kansas never would have been in reach of the Heels for total wins at this point. Yay, irony!
Any others that I've missed?
Anyway, I missed the Colorado game, but I loved the LJW's wordless highlight reel. Great to see Tyshawn and X back on track.
Thanks for the great post, dgl.
ReplyDeleteThat bit about getting up toward the most wins ever (EVER!) is pretty damn impressive.
I'll have more to say soon I'm sure, but in the meantime I just want to defend the media against folks like Deron, who always seem to want to pick on those journalists and such:
It seems clear from the post-game press conference footage that it's KU and Coach Self who're insisting on Brady, not our noble media.
Just sayin'.
OK, my apologies to "the media."
ReplyDeleteEven worse is the fact that I forgot the most important record of all: total program wins. I'm going to edit that into the post now.
X has scored in double figures for, I think, four games in a row.
ReplyDeleteIf he, and Tyshawn remain offensive threats, we start looking a lot like the 08 team in terms of balance.
I mean, teams are still going to focus mostly on Sherron and Cole. But if X and Ty keep it up . . . and don't sleep on Marcus. He may have only scored 5 against CU, but he's been our most consistent player in Big 12 play.
That gives us 5 starters who can light it up.
Maximizing the potential of Tyshawn, X, and Marcus seems like the key to us going all the way.
Can you believe the Big 12 has 5 teams in the top 25?
ReplyDeleteKU(#1), KSU(#5!), TU(13), A&M(17), Baylor(20).
ACC has one team in the top 25 for the first time in 33 years.
Doesn't it also seem odd that if the tournament were seeded today, Purdue would be a 1 seed?
The ACC thing is unbelievable, and it makes UNC's struggles that much more baffling.
ReplyDeletePurdue's been in and out of the top 4. You're going to have a couple of 1 seeds this year who just aren't very imposing -- even K-State and Duke are in the running. A lot of lower seeds will feel very confident about making the Final 4 IF they don't have KU or UK in their region.
Re. your point about Tyshawn and X -- also don't overlook their improvement on the defensive end. This has been an underrated strength for TT as the season has progressed -- Self mentions it a lot, *THE MEDIA* ignores it. (WAKE UP, SHEEPLE!)