14 in a row trumps 1 in a row by a factor of a million

Well, the streak is over. I decided to wait to write the post-mortem until this morning so I could find some real perspective. It is still a bit sore this morning but I do think I have a far better perspective.

Last night the Duke Blue Devils managed to eke out a 1 point victory at home against arguably the worst team in one of the power 6 conferences, Wake Forest (actually ranked 170th overall and 73rd of the 75 power conference teams--Washington St, (205) and California (268) are worse). And had Wake Forest made the last second shot, Duke would have lost. This is a Duke team that has lost for the last 4 games the clear consensus No. 1 player in the June NBA draft, Zion Williamson. Yet Duke still has 5 other McDonald's All-Americans and 2 high lottery picks and three likely 1st rounders. Yet they lucked out to win the game by a single point---at home! Much ado was made about the loss of Williamson to the knee injury. Duke is the darling of the college basketball media world and their problems are always greeted with lots of ink and angst. Surely the loss of the best player in the game is going to have an effect on a team. But the effect seems to be lessened in absolute terms when you bring another McD-AA off the bench to replace him. Yet with all the star power and glitzy highly ranked players, Duke barely managed to beat a team they were favored by almost 30 points over at home. There is an explanation. The two most efficacious reasons for this poor performance is that Duke still started 3 freshmen and Duke has had to adjust the way they play after the loss of Williamson.

I relay to you the Duke saga because unless you are oblivious to national sports media you can't help but be overwhelmed by the analysis and ad nauseum ink spilled over the various analyses of Duke's season. Yet if you buy the argument that freshmen can be wildly inconsistent and that having to radically adjust the style and manner of play for the loss of a key player, take what Duke is going through and multiply it by 2 or 3 or 4 and you get Kansas' season.

No matter how you slice it, this KU season has not met expectations. Now that can pretty much be said about any season where we do not win the Big 12 and make at least the Final Four. That is a statement to the ultra high expectations we have become accustomed to for our beloved Jayhawks the last 30 years. Yet when you step back and look with a more measured and objective perspective, it becomes clear that we have far more to be joyful and pleased with than to be in angst or disappointment.

Let's take this years team. As of right now, this team is getting almost 65% of the minutes played from freshmen and almost 85% of the minutes played from first year players with the program. Both of these factors matter. Few transfers have ever hit the ground running and the ones that have were seniors or at least juniors. This season, Dedric hit the ground running but the other two not so much. This crop of freshmen has shown potential but have clearly played with a lack of consistency and a lack of mental toughness. We can blame the coaching staff all day but the reality is, freshmen play like freshmen, even Duke All-Americans and future lottery picks. Just look at the Duke team who have the three most talented freshmen in the country and 4 supposed 1st rounders. KU's team is a phenomenally young and inexperienced team. Younger and more inexperienced than any team in KU under Self or Williams. That matters.

And what of the necessity to adjust. This started early in the season when the rotation was adjusted when Self decided to not play De Sousa. That was relatively minor early on but it is not arguable that after losing Udoka that loss became a much more significant loss. Then there was the big whammy, the loss of Udoka. Looking back I certainly underestimated the impact Udoka had on this team. Losing Udoka has been nothing short of devastating. It is devastating for several reasons. KU was 9-0 with Udoka against some of the toughest and best teams in the country. We are 13-8 without him. 'nuf said!! Adjusting a style of play that was centered around Udoka to a very large degree has been a season in progress. To a large degree the knobs that can be turned are limited. Self has done a nice job overall in a very difficult situation.

Not only have we lost Udoka and Silvio but in a sense we have lost Quentin and in reality we have lost LaGerald. How have we lost Quentin? It is clear from the way we played in the ealry games that Quentin loomed fairly large in the scheme designed by Self. Quentin, aside from a few games, has not lived into that scheme. Devon filled some of that gap, early on, LaGerald played like he actually wasn't a total head case and Dedric was exceeding expectations. But as the season progressed, LaGerald showed he is a total head case and we had no one who could be the driver/slasher on the perimeter. Plus, LaGerald did some nice things early but the real LaGerald we all feared to be true eventually emerged and his complete and total lack of mental toughness won out and he became a liability. I do pin some of the LaGerald on Self but Grimes is just a freshman luck of the draw. Then, of course, Marcus sat out 4 games with a sprained ankle.

So this is a team that has huge gaps. All the gaps can be explained by the above. Had Udoka stayed healthy, Silvio been eligible, Grimes or LaGerald played more effectively in the role of the perimeter shooter/slasher, we would still have one huge problem but that has actually been mostly a bright spot instead of a glaring problem. What is that? That is, of course, the fact we have a freshman point guard. That is always a problem. That was going to be our biggest challenge going into the season. As it stands, Dotson has been far more effective than I anticipated for sure. He still has gaps. He does not pass well, he can be turnover prone and his biggest problem has been game management in crunch time. But that was clear and expected from the get-go. That is always the fear with a freshman point guard. Guards rule in college.

So we are left with a team that is desperately trying to fill gaps that have kept popping up as the season progressed. We are left with a phenomenally young and inexperienced team that has lost a few ultra key components. A 22-8 season, while not acceptable by normal KU standards is not so bad when you put the perspective in.

Now what about losing the Big 12 race after 14 straight. My biggest frustration is that the first reaction to the national sports media is that "KU LOSSES BIG 12" Fair enough. But what if KU had won 15 straight? Less ink would have been spilled on that story just like last season when they won 14 in a row to set the record. It was largely met with ho-hum. The greatest conference dominance in the history of major college sports and it was ho-hum. I give Jay Williams major kudos. His first reaction after the game was not to announce that KU lost the Big 12 but to give Self a standing ovation for the 14th straight. We KU fans have been treated to something that will likely never happen again. We have been part of a run that has been nothing short of amazing, spectacular, awesome and wonderful. That is a perspective that should prevail.

ESPN had a headline on the website this morning, "How Kansas' Big 12 Supremacy Unraveled." That makes my blood boil. The article is fine it is the headline that is wildly unfair. It is true but wildly out of perspective. I read the article and while I would order the items differently, I agreed with everything in the article. But why such a harsh choice of words in the title? Whatever. The final piece in that article and in my analysis (which largely parallels that article) is the state of the Big 12. Even with all the losses and adjustments and gaps, this KU team is not a bad team. It is merely a decent team, albeit less than decent on the road. But the flip side is, the Big 12 is very good and has been very good for many years. In fact, in 5 of the last 6 seasons, the Big 12 has been ranked number 1. Winning in a league that has top to bottom the best teams in the country is impressive. Doing it twice is super impressive. Doing it 5 times and 14 overall is beyond words. This season is a little different in that the Big 12 has no elite teams but 1 through 8 the teams are top 40 and OSU and West Virginia can still bite. KU's margin for error is and always has been razor thin. This was the season when a decent KU team could not overcome the razor thin margin. That was always destined to happen eventually. We have had some good breaks in the last 14 years and some bad breaks in the last 14 years. But we have always managed to land on the right side of the razor thin margin. This year the losses and gaps were too big to fill. Congrats to K-State and/or Texas Tech. It is worth noting, both are senior laden teams among the oldest and most experienced in the conference. Just sayin'.

One streak that is still alive but could be at risk if we lose a couple more games before the NCAA is the streak of being in the top 25. I have KU currently ranked 23rd in my DPPI. Fortunately, the composite of the 64 computer rankings has KU quite a bit higher. And I think our early season dominance will play large with the voters enough to keep us in the top 25. But that is a streak that is still in tact. We have been in the top 25 for 196 consecutive weeks. Only two teams have reached 200. UCLA had 221 consecutive weeks from 1966 through 1980. Duke made it to 200 in 1996-2007. If we can stay in the next 2 polls this season, we will easily break Duke's record next season and UCLA's the season after that. It would be nice to own that record as well.

Not that this should be surprising, but I spent a few minutes yesterday building a model to run probabilities for the NCAA tourney. KU currently has about a 2 in 1000 probability of winning. Remember 1988?

Great post and always appreciate your data, analysis and perspective. The Duke perspective/analogy is spot on.

The other bit here with respect to the # of minutes by the freshmen/first year players is the amount of pressure they must have felt when the streak was slipping. Incoming freshmen and OADs at other schools do not have a "streak" in the back of their minds. Last night's game had to be immense, a must game on the road against a team with experience, and "having" to win to keep the streak alive. Regardless of what they say in interviews, it was in their mind. Even Devonte admitted last year that while they didn't talk about it, they all knew that they didn't want to be the team that lost the streak.

85% of the minutes from frosh/first year players, I would venture to say no other team during the streak had that lopsided ratio.

Rock Chalk!

Great points about Duke. About the ESPN story (which by the way I linked to in Konza's post 4 threads below), you know what they say - headlines sell newspapers. Frankly, I could think of a lot worse headlines. Given that, IMHO, the article was fair and very informative.
Guess the Big 12 tourney will be telling, then on to the NCAA tourney.