Today officially marks the beginning of March. Over the coming weeks, the collegiate basketball world’s eyes will be fully shifted towards the Big Dance.
For the Jayhawks, this is, of course, no new occurrence. Kansas has reached the NCAA Tournament every year since 1989 and has come up trumps twice under current head coach Bill Self in 2008 and 2022.
However, despite the fantastic record that Self and his staff have compiled over his tenure, which spans back to 2003, it doesn’t take an acute eye to notice that since Self lifted the title over UNC in a thrilling 72-69 2022 comeback victory, things haven’t quite gone to plan.
Since 2022, the Jayhawks have not gotten past the round of 32 of the NCAA Tournament, with two losses to Arkansas sandwiching a thumping defeat at the hands of Gonzaga.
A back-and-forth season for the Jayhawks
This iteration of Kansas has seen a share of ups and downs throughout the season that have equally placed sky-high expectations over this group, while also sending them right back down to earth, and there is no better proof of that than Kansas’ last 13 games.
Kansas was just hours off the heels of an 11-point loss to the West Virginia Mountaineers, in a game that called for a players-only meeting ahead of their crucial matchup against the No. 2 Iowa State Cyclones. Not only did KU dismantle Iowa State, but that win spurred an eight-game winning streak that took a previously unranked side up to No. 9 in the country, while also finishing with four wins over AP top 25 competition.
Yet over the last five games, Kansas has gone just 2-3, albeit four of those games were against top-five competition; there has been little for fans to truly grasp onto in their hopes for postseason success.
CBS Sports gives Kansas this avenue for end-of-season glory
In CBS Sports’ recent article previewing the 68 biggest things to know heading into the NCAA Tournament, the Jayhawks were selected under a subcategory labeled, “Capable and talented, but the draw is everything.”
“KU is a tall team, but it doesn't have a ton of bricks in its britches,” writes Issac Trotter.
“Both Cincinnati and Arizona have big-boy'd Kansas in paint during the last seven days alone. If Kansas can avoid a dynamic front-line, it will have a shot. Do you really want to play Darryn Peterson, Melvin Council, Flory Bidunga and Bill Self in March? Yeah, me neither.”
The biggest glare facing Kansas right now is its work on the glass. In the aforementioned losses to Cincinnati and Arizona are the 88 rebounds they have given up, all while notching just 55 of their own.
As Trotter rightly points out, players like Peterson, Council, and Bidunga can be game changers. Peterson effortlessly scored 24 points in KU’s loss to the Wildcats on Saturday. Council has an innate ability to create tough baskets with phenomenal work in the air on his drives to the rim, and Bidunga has emerged as one of the nation’s top defenders, having been nominated to the 2026 Naismith Men's College Defensive Player of the Year Late-Season Team. Bidunga’s 2.75 blocks per game sit third in the country.
The biggest question that plagues clouds Kansas’ future is whether or not these factors can combine at the right time to create the perfect storm.
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