It’s crazy to think that the season is already nearly halfway over. Over the last two months, the Big 12 had a terrific non-conference run. The league notched wins over the likes of Duke, Kentucky, North Carolina, Memphis, Iowa, Michigan and Gonzaga; the conference proved that it has its share of individual stars beyond Marcus Smart and Andrew Wiggins, viewed as the toasts of the league back in November; and an argument can be made rather easily that the Big 12 is the best league in the country (or at least has had the best run to date). With league play tipping off tomorrow, it’s time for the Big 12 microsite contributors to take a look back and hand out some accolades, as well as shine a light on a some players and coaches from whom we expected a little more in the season’s first two months.

Player Of The Year

Marcus Smart headlines a deep roster of individual standouts in the Big 12. (Stephen R. Sylvanie/USA Today)

• Kory Carpenter: Melvin Ejim, Iowa State: Ejim is third in the conference in scoring with 17.2 points per game and is fifth in field goal percentage, making 52.5 percent of his shots. He nearly averages a double-double as well, grabbing 8.1 rebounds per game.
• Taylor Erickson: Marcus Smart, Oklahoma State – Smart has cooled off a bit recently after averaging over 31 points per game during a three-game stretch earlier in the season, but this award appears to be his to lose heading into Big 12 play. The conference slate should provide plenty of high-profile games that will undoubtedly deliver some great individual performances, allowing us to more confidently identify the league’s best player. Andrew Wiggins has been good, but for the time being, he hasn’t done enough to knock Smart from his perch.
• Brian Goodman: Marcus Smart, Oklahoma State – Overall, Smart’s efficiency numbers have improved, and he’s still playing defense at a very high level. The Big 12 is as well-stocked with talent as any conference in the country, and Smart has produced the most for his team. That being said, the book on him is out. Whether he can score from outside when teams take away the paint could be the deciding factor for his POY candidacy.

Coach of The Year

• BG: Fred Hoiberg – After the Cyclones outperformed expectations the last two years, Big 12 coaches vowed to stop sleeping on Iowa State, tabbing ISU to finish fourth in the annual preseason poll. As it turns out, even that may have been too low. Right now, the Cyclones are no worse than the third-best team in the conference, and Oklahoma State’s personnel issues could give ISU an opening to climb even higher.
• TE: Fred Hoiberg – All Hoiberg has done is taken a team that lost several top scorers from a season ago and turned that into a 12-0 start to the college basketball season. Iowa State has three players averaging over 15 points per game, and it became the first school in league history to have five different players win player of the week honors.

Read the rest of this entry »

When Tarik Black transferred to Kansas back in May, the perception was that the former Memphis Tiger would contribute experience, stability, and strength down low while the Jayhawks developed Perry Ellis into a consistent threat and showed Joel Embiid what it took to succeed at the college level. Kansas needed to rebuild its frontcourt after Jeff Withey and Kevin Young graduated, and Black was going to be relied upon to do for Bill Self what several players have done for coaches looking to the NCAA’s post-graduate transfer rule for help with roster turnover: provide a leg up and buy the staff time to develop its younger pieces. Then the season started, but a weird thing happened. Black sat and sat and sat.

Tarik Black could be emerging for the Jayhawks just in time for conference play. (Charlie Riedel/AP)

Unable to stay out of foul trouble, Black played just six minutes against Duke in Kansas’ biggest game of their non-conference slate. He played eight minutes in the team’s first loss, a 63-59 defeat at the hands of Villanova. He committed at least three fouls in six of his first seven games and seven of his first eight as a Jayhawk. Even when given extended minutes, he struggled to stay productive, missing close looks, while Embiid showed such accelerated development that he earned Black’s spot in the starting lineup. As a point of reference, when Embiid started playing organized basketball three years ago, Black was beginning his collegiate career after committing to Memphis as a highly-touted prospect. Read the rest of this entry »

1. The rapid maturation of Kansas center Joel Embiid was on display once again in the Jayhawks’ big win over Georgetown on Saturday. Embiid scored 17 points on just four shots, harassing the Hoyas into foul trouble throughout the game. Without injecting his draft stock into the conversation, it remains downright scary where Embiid could be come March if he continues to develop at the current rate.
2. Oklahoma State coach Travis Ford acknowledges how good his team already is, but like any coach in the country right now, he knows that there’s plenty of room for improvement. The Cowboys have continued to roll along and still figure to contend for the Big 12 crown, but unlike Kansas, Iowa State and even Baylor, Oklahoma State hasn’t grabbed many national headlines away from their home court. That’s not always a bad thing, though, as pressure to perform can derail a lot of teams.
3. West Virginia has had plenty of chances to make a positive statement this season, but while they were never expected to live in the upper echelon of the Big 12, their season so far has been a complete dud. Sunday’s home loss to Purdue just put the Mountaineers under more pressure to overachieve once conference play gears up, and Bob Huggins won’t argue that his team still has plenty of work to do.
4. A concerted effort to be more aggressive on the glass has been big for Kansas State after a rough start to their season, and it paid dividends once again in the Wildcats’ big weekend win over Gonzaga. Bruce Weber’s team collected at least 71 percent of available defensive rebounds for the third straight time on Saturday, and with a limited scoring arsenal at their disposal, preventing second-chance buckets will be one of the keys if the Wildcats are to win an uphill battle towards an at-large bid.
5. TCU point guard Kyan Anderson was crucial as he helped dig his team out of a double-figure deficit against Tulsa over the weekend. Oddly, of the Horned Frogs’ seven wins against D-I opponents this season, two of them have come over the Golden Hurricane, which plays in a different conference. TCU is unlikely to find many Tulsas lying around the Big 12 this season, however, so it’s a good thing they were able to get those two wins.

1. If you missed Iowa State’s annual game against Iowa Friday night, you missed a great one. Both teams were ranked for the first time in what seems like forever (26 years), and the sold-out Hilton Coliseum crowd was rewarded with an 85-82 Cyclones’ win over the Hawkeyes. Georges Niang had 24 points, telling Bobby La Gesse of the Ames Tribune: “I felt like it was my night.” Iowa State improved to 8-0 with the win and barring a home upset against George Mason or Northern Illinois over the next two-plus, will enter 2014 and Big 12 play undefeated.
2. If you haven’t seen Kansas center Joel Embiid’s Hakeem Olajuwon/Dream Shake impression yet, drop what you’re doing and watch the GIF at the bottom of this SI.com piece, or check out the full video here. It’s amazing that Embiid was a soccer player until just a few years ago who is still relatively new to playing basketball. He shot up the recruiting rankings during his last year of high school and is shooting up NBA mock drafts this season. Don’t be shocked if he becomes a top-three pick next summer.
3. Marcus Smart appears to have changed his game following Oklahoma State’s loss to Memphis two weeks ago. “I’m just trying to focus and make sure I don’t force a lot of things because I do have a talented group of guys around me,” he told John Helsley of The Oklahoman after the Cowboys’ 70-55 win over Louisiana Tech Saturday. Smart had 13 points, five assists, and four steals in the win.
4. CBSSports.com NBA writer Matt Moore updated his 2014 mock draft over the weekend and Andrew Wiggins fell to the second pick overall behind Duke freshman Jabari Parker. Joel Embiid was fourth, Marcus Smart seventh, Wayne Selden eighth, Perry Ellis 25th, and Isaiah Austin 29th. Second round selections included Cory Jefferson at 44th and Le’Bryan Nash at 51st. Moore had this to say about Nash, the former five-star recruit: “Such a highly touted high school player doesn’t seem to have enough to offer a sure player to make a roster, but he’s not bad enough to fall out of the draft completely, right?”
5. Andrew Wiggins and Joel Embiid have gotten most of the national spotlight this season, and rightly so, as both players are likely top-five picks. But it’s no coincidence that as Perry Ellis goes, so go the Jayhawks,  Jeff Borzello at CBSSports.com writes. As he notes, Ellis has struggled in Kansas’ bad games and been great in big wins, most notably his 24-point, nine-rebound performance in the Jayhawks’ 94-83 over Duke last month.

“Quality over quantity” might be the best way to describe Tuesday night in college basketball. A majority of schools are in finals week, and as a result, players need their study time. So that means rest. Or easy opponents. Or both. But that wasn’t the case with No. 13 Kansas and No. 19 Florida yesterday. It’s safe to assume that these two schools aren’t in finals prep this week, so they took the opportunity to play each other in Gainesville. Jayhawks coach Bill Self went with four freshmen in the starting lineup. It perhaps wasn’t the greatest of ideas against the Gators’ dual point guard system, but it was the Gators’ zone that stifled Joel Embiid, Perry Ellis and most of the rest of the Jayhawks, leading to a 67-61 win. This prompted a short debate about KU’s offense versus the zone.

If Indiana played Kansas and each zoned the other, would anyone score?

— Dana O'Neil (@ESPNDanaOneil) December 11, 2013

Part of the situation with Self seemed weird. Why start four freshmen? It almost seemed like a move that Chuck Daly would make, a la the 1992 Dream Team’s scrimmage against that college all-star team (although I’d be willing to bet Self wouldn’t throw the game.) Maybe it was a move to prepare the Jayhawks’ youth for the conference season, when trips to Manhattan, Stillwater, Ames and Norman await.

Kansas' Bill Self gives Joel Embiid his first career start. Jayhawks will start four freshmen against Gators tonight.

— Jeff Goodman (@GoodmanESPN) December 11, 2013

That youth showed early for Kansas, who allowed the Gators to go on an blistering 21-0 run. Andrew Wiggins keyed a near comeback, bringing his team back to within range before Florida held them off. For the most part, Kansas was sloppy with the ball, couldn’t shoot and was horrible defensively.

Pretty amazing 21-0 run by Florida. And that's with four missed fts during the run.

— Pat Dooley (@pat_dooley) December 11, 2013

Another Andrew Wiggins three gets Kansas within six of Florida. Only 1:20 to go. ESPN.

— Nicole Auerbach (@NicoleAuerbach) December 11, 2013

That was the 24th turnover for Kansas. Yes, 24. Seriously.

— Myron Medcalf (@MedcalfByESPN) December 11, 2013

It all added up to a 67-61 loss. Read the rest of this entry »

1. The Big 12 offices released their weekly awards and this week’s honorees are Baylor’s Cory Jefferson for Player of the Week and Kansas’ Joel Embiid for Newcomer of the Week. Jefferson averaged 14 points, 7.8 rebounds, and 1.5 blocks per game as he helped the Bears make somewhat of a surprise appearance in the EA Sports Maui Invitational championship game. Jefferson currently leads his team in scoring (13.5) and rebounding (8.8) for the season. Embiid put up 9.7 points, 5.7 rebounds, and 3.3 blocks in three games at the Battle 4 Atlantis. Bill Self told the media following their win over UTEP that Embiid has “got to play more minutes…without fouling.” If this is how he’s playing after picking up basketball two years ago, I’m sure he’ll correct that issue soon enough.
2. Hello, Texas fan. Caught up in the ups and downs of another football season and know nothing about the hoops squad? Burnt Orange Nation has your back with a breakdown of each player’s performance going into last night’s game vs Vanderbilt. The young Horns have three point guards and improved big men such as shooter Connor Lammert and center Cameron Ridley, who doesn’t look totally spooked when he gets the ball down on the block anymore. Their 7-1 record will be put to the test with Temple, North Carolina, and Michigan State popping up on their schedule in three of the next four games.
3. Normally, a trip to the Bahamas is a good thing, but not if you ask Bill Self. “I’m not depressed,” Self said. “I would say frustrated, but not just me. I think the players are frustrated, too, knowing we didn’t play like we are capable of playing while we were down here. Sure, the Jayhawks dropped one to Ryan Arcidiacono and Villanova but that was followed by a nervous win to a UTEP team going into Saturday at 4-3. On Sunday morning, he decided to give his players the opportunity to ride the rsort’s water slide. Did Self tag along? “I did not,” Self told the Lawrence Journal-World. Hard to believe Self and this guy are the same person.
4. The return of Thomas Gipson is a welcome one for a Kansas State team struggling to find its offensive identity. He suffered a concussion in the early stages of the season and missed the first two games. Since playing starter’s minutes again, Gipson is averaging 17.6 points and 7.3 rebounds helping the Wildcats win two of their last three. Boy, do they need him. He now joins freshman Marcus Foster as the only two players averaging double-digit scoring. To be seven games into a soft non-conference schedule and rank 302nd out of nearly 350 Division I teams is discouraging for a team coming off a shared Big 12 title last year. It is going to be a long season in the Little Apple.
5. What’s this: West Virginia is…scoring? They defeated Loyola (MD) 96-47 last night that saw five Mountaineers in double-figures: Remi Dibo (19), Terry Henderson (16), Eron Harris (14), Kevin Noreen (13), and Nathan Adrian (11). Through eight games this year, West Virginia is averaging 85.1 points per game compared to 69.3 through eight games last season. Now the month of December brings the meat of their non-conference schedule with a road date at Missouri followed by a home tilt against Gonzaga next Tuesday. Are they at-large worthy? That could be determined in the next seven days.

With Feast Week already in high gear, we’re outlining the roads ahead for prominent Big 12 teams involved in neutral site events this week.

What They’ve Done So Far: The #2 Kansas Jayhawks have played as well as fans could have expected through four games this season. They have beaten three cupcakes by 22.3 PPG and knocked off then-#4 Duke at the Champions Classic in Chicago. The inside-out combination of sophomore forward Perry Ellis and freshman guard Andrew Wiggins is averaging 16.8 PPG, freshman center Joel Embiid showed flashes of greatness in his 16-point, 13-rebound performance against Iona, and the Jayhawks lead the country in field goal shooting at 56.8 percent. The one major concern heading into the season — point guard play — has been anything but a problem early. Junior Naadir Tharpe is averaging 6.7 APG with a 3.3 to 1 assist-to-turnover ratio, and freshman backup Frank Mason has been nearly as impressive, playing 18 MPG and averaging 8.3 PPG, 3.5 APG, and just 0.5 turnovers per game. Bill Self has about 87 different lineups he can throw out at anytime — he can go big, small, fast or slow and there isn’t much of a dropoff between each combination. The Jayhawks are deeper than any team Self has had; they have three potential one-and-done freshmen in the starting lineup in Andrew Wiggins, Wayne Selden and Joel Embiid; and, they have veterans like Naadir Tharpe and Perry Ellis to guide the youngsters. It’s not too early to say Final Four or Bust with this team.

Andrew Wiggins Leads Kansas To The Bahamas This Week.

First Round Preview Wake Forest is 5-0 but the competition has been less than stellar in that record. Wins over Colgate, VMI, Presbyterian, Jacksonville, and The Citadel aren’t proper warm-ups for a Top 25 team, much less a team as talented as Kansas. Defensively, the Jayhawks will need to slow down sophomore guard Codi Miller-McIntyre, who leads the Demon Deacons with 18.6 PPG and 4.8 APG. He opened the season with four straight 20-point games and is the focal point for the Deacons’ offense. Rebounding will be key in this first round match-up. Wake Forest is currently second in the nation with 49.2 RPG, but Kansas is grabbing 83 percent of its opponents’ misses, fifth best in the country. The Demon Deacons aren’t far behind themselves at 81 percent.

Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve seen about two weeks of the college basketball season fly by, and between ESPN’s 24 Hours of College Basketball, the State Farm Champions Classic, and the bevy of compelling storylines, there’s been no shortage of great things to discuss. So this week’s College Basketball by the Tweets focuses on Tuesday night, with a strong slate of games to choose from and an unlimited supply of tweets to embed. The night belonged to the scorers — the men who eschewed passing and got their shots up. When it was all said and done, seven players finished with more than 30 points, led by Wisconsin forward Frank Kaminsky‘s 43, which was a school record. Jahii Carson poured in 40 as well for Arizona State. What were some of the reactions around the Twitter-verse?

Jahii Carson. 40.

— Jeff Borzello (@jeffborzello) November 20, 2013

Ariz St finishes off UNLV. Jahii Carson had 40 points and 7 assts. Not a bad night at the office.

— Seth Davis (@SethDavisHoops) November 20, 2013

True "@raphiellej: "@MedcalfByESPN: UNLV just can't do anything with Carson. Wow." Not many can."

— Myron Medcalf (@MedcalfByESPN) November 20, 2013

Wisconsin's Frank Kaminsky scored a total of 63 points in his freshman year. He scored 43 points against North Dakota tonight. Wow.

— Jay Bilas (@JayBilas) November 20, 2013

Tell me the Avatar photo isn't terrific of Frank "The Tank" Kaminsky. Take a close look. It's phenomenal.

— Jeff Goodman (@GoodmanESPN) November 20, 2013

Also, lost in all this is the play of North Dakota’s Troy Huff, who scored 37 points of his own in the 103-85 loss to the Badgers.

Troy Huff came off the bench to score 37 pts in 28 mins. @GMT_ronreezy also scored 19 off the bench on 7/10 FG. Crazy offensive numbers.

— Jonathan Reed (@bigskybball) November 20, 2013

We also saw those same freshman we were introduced to last week, and they backed up their first big-time performance with solid games on Tuesday night. Jabari Parker, for instance, went end-to-end for a huge dunk the Duke’s 83-74 victory over East Carolina. And Twitter went off. Read the rest of this entry »

1. Credit to Gary Parrish for calling his shot about 10 hours before Marcus Smart went off for 39 points in a rout of Memphis in Stillwater. “But Smart now has a nice opportunity to shift the national conversation back in his direction, because the big stage will be all his on this Tuesday night.” Andrew Wiggins played Tuesday night, as did Jabari Parker and Julius Randle and Aaron Gordon. But Smart stole the spotlight from the fabulous freshmen, reminding us all that he is still the best guard in the country.
2. Kansas freshman center Joel Embiid had a big day Monday. Jayhawk beat writer Rustin Dodd featured him in an excellent article, as Embiid’s dad watched him play for the first time in his life, and he finished with 16 points, 13 rebounds, and three blocks in an 86-66 victory. He was 7-7 from the floor and had a few buckets that made you realize he probably won’t be in a Kansas uniform last season. The biggest defense for the second-ranked Jayhawks is still protecting the rim, and as Dodd points out, Self is working with Embiid to play more like former Jayhawk and shot block-extraordinaire Jeff Withey. If that happens, this team will be complete.
3. Last season Juwan Staten ran the West Virginia offense and the results weren’t pretty. Staten had a respectable statline of 7.6 PPG and an assist-to-turnover ratio of better than 2/1. But as Bob Hertzel points out, last year West Virginia was bad. Really bad. #219 in the country bad. And fair or not, that blame went largely to the point guard. A year later, Staten is averaging 20 PPG, 7.3 APG, and is shooting over 51 percent through three games.
4. Texas is 4-0 for the first time in four years thanks in some part to the hustle of Jonathan Holmes, who lost parts of couple teeth diving for a loose ball in Monday night’s 89-61 win over Houston Baptist. The biggest takeaway from the win, as Chris Hummer notes, is that freshman guard Kendal Yancy got the start over returning leading scorer Javan Felix. It was a good move to get Yancy some starting experience in a game the Longhorns would control because Rick Barnes will need all the help he can get this season to keep his job.
5. If you want good seats in the Kansas student section, whether the Jayhawks are playing Iona or Towson or Missou…Kansas State, you better like early mornings, sitting, and waiting. It’s a somewhat complicated system that is run close to perfection considering it is run by students and students only. But don’t let Elise Reuter of the Kansas City Star fool you about some of the camping group names. Back in the day, when Kansas and Missouri still played, Bill Self once handed out pizzas before reading the list of the 200 or so groups, many of which would make your grandmother blush. “You guys toned it down this year,” he said. “Last season was much worse.”