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Arizona, ASU step up: Big 12 men’s basketball brings elite entertainment, competition

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Arizona, ASU step up: Big 12 men’s basketball brings elite entertainment, competition

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It is a new era for Arizona State men’s basketball. The Pac-12 tenure is over and it is on to an even more competitive Big 12. How tough is that expected to be? Well, five Big 12 teams opened the season ranked in the top 10 nationally.

Preseason publications are high on the Big 12, too, as Lindy’s pegs five in the top 10 and another inside its top 25.

The SEC likes to claim supremacy in most sports and some coaches cited it in men’s basketball but Big 12 coaches stick up for their own.

“This is going to be the hardest year to win our league, in large part because of unbalanced scheduling, too, depending on who you play at home and who you play on the road and who you play twice and all those things,” Kansas coach Bill Self said at Big 12 media day last month.

“You look at it the way that maybe we used to, that it’s a win-the-league-at-all-costs deal. You look at it more as if we can compete and be at the top of this league, we’ve got a chance. Even though disappointment comes when you don’t win, you’d better be equipped to be disappointed some because nobody is going to run the table.”

Added Cincinnati coach Wes Miller:

“Everybody is going to beat the drum for their league. When people stand up here and say we have the best league, it’s not a slight towards anybody else’s league or disrespect. It’s fact. Just look at the numbers.”

So the likes of UCLA and Oregon won’t be stopping by Desert Financial Arena, but there will be some great games nonetheless. Teams will play 20-game conference schedules so there will be a lot of teams the Sun Devils will play only once. ASU’s first game of the Big 12 era will come on Dec. 31 when it plays at Brigham Young, a team it has faced in the past in nonconference play.

There will be two familiar faces donning different uniforms this season as point guard Frankie Collins is now at TCU after two years in Tempe, and Devan Cambridge is in his second year at Texas Tech after playing for ASU in the 2022-23 season. Cambridge played eight games for the Red Raiders last season before sustaining a season-ending knee injury.

Fans liked the Pac-12 Tournament at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas but will now look to the Big 12 event at T-Mobile Center in Kansas City from March 11-15. The women’s event will be at the same venue March 5-10.

Here’s a quick look at the top five teams in the Big 12 and when and where ASU will be playing them.

Kansas

Self enters his 22nd year at Kansas and will likely pick up career win No. 800 this month.

The Jayhawks (23-11 last season) are a perennial national title contender with four titles in hand, the most recent in 2022. Both national polls start the season with Kansas at No. 1, due in large part to 7-foot-2 center Hunter Dickinson (17.9 ppg, 10.9 rpg), now in his second year in Kansas after three seasons at Michigan.

Then you have senior Dajuan Harris (8.5 ppg, 6.5 apg), in his fourth year as the starting point guard, and senior forward K.J. Adams (12.6 ppg, 4.6 rpg). Self added four impact transfers, the most notable being A.J. Storr (16.8 ppg) from Wisconsin.

The Sun Devils will play Kansas just once, on Jan. 8 at Phog Allen Fieldhouse in Lawrence. That’s the third Big 12 game of the season, which probably doesn’t help ASU because of the number of newcomers it has to rely upon.

One thing that makes this matchup intriguing is ASU’s history against the Jayhawks. ASU defeated then-No. 2 Kansas 95-85 in 2018 and 80-76 the following season in Tempe when the Jayhawks were No. 1.

Kansas plays Arizona only once, that coming on March 8 in Lawrence in the last game of the regular season.

Houston

Veteran Kelvin Sampson (264-79) is in his 10th year heading Houston and is likely to surpass the 700-win mark for his career in the middle of this season.

The Cougars are ranked fourth in both national polls, coming off a season in which they went 32-5 and lost to Duke in the Sweet 16, 54-51. Four starters are back, led by fifth-year senior guard L.J. Cryer (15.5 ppg), who led that tough conference in 3-pointers with 112, and junior guard Emmanuel Sharp (12.6 ppg). The top newcomer should be Oklahoma transfer Milos Uzan, who started 32 games as a sophomore for the Sooners.

Last season, Houston ranked first in the country in scoring defense (57.6 ppg) and turnover margin.

This is another opponent ASU will see only once, that coming on Feb. 18 at Desert Financial Arena. The Cougars will play Arizona the same week, at noon on Feb. 15.

Iowa State

The Cyclones are ranked fifth in one national poll and sixth in the other, coming off a 29-8 finish that included a second-place showing in the Big 12 regular season. Iowa State won the championship game over Baylor at the conference tournament.

While many teams reload annually through the transfer portal, the Cyclones have not had to go that route. They return five of their top eight players, led by one of the premier players in the country, junior guard Tamin Lipsey (12.4 ppg, 4.9 apg) who recorded the seventh triple-double in school history last season against DePaul. He is recognized as one of the top defensive players in the country.

Iowa State did add four transfers but they are likely depth pieces and not starters. The best of those should be center Dishon Jackson (11.4 ppg, 6.1 rpg) who started 30 games last season at Charlotte.

ASU’s only game against Iowa State comes on Jan. 25. The Cyclones will play Arizona twice, on Jan. 27 in Tucson and in Ames on March 1.

Baylor

The Bears are headed by Scott Drew, older brother of Grand Canyon coach Bryce Drew. Baylor went 24-11 last season and it started the new campaign ranked eighth in both national polls before its opening-night blowout loss to Gonzaga in Spokane, Washington, 101-63.

Baylor landed one of the top players in the portal in 6-7 forward Norchad Omier (17 ppg, 10 rpg), an all-ACC selection who led Miami to a first Final Four appearance. Another intriguing newcomer is Duke transfer Jeremy Roach who boasts 108 career starts with 1,469 points and 402 assists in his four years with the Blue Devils.

The Bears also have elite freshman VJ Edgecomb, a 6-5 guard touted as a probable NBA lottery pick.

Baylor, which won a national title in 2021, stops at ASU on Jan. 11 and heads to Tucson to face Arizona on Jan. 14. The Wildcats will also play in Waco on Feb. 17.

Arizona

The Wildcats, third in the country in scoring a year ago, start a new season ranked ninth in one poll and 10th in the other. They return Caleb Love (18 ppg), who tested the NBA waters before opting to return. He’ll look to increase his stock after a tough postseason a year ago. Junior guard Jaden Bradley was stellar coming off the bench last season and should successfully make the jump to full-time starter.

Four starters have departed, two transferring to other schools, but coach Tommy Lloyd found some quality replacements, Trey Townsend (17.3 ppg, 8.1 rpg), who led Oakland’s surge in the postseason, and Anthony Dell’Orso (19.5 ppg) from Campbell.

Arizona will also have some size with 7-footers Henri Veesaar and Motiejus Krivas and has a five-star freshman in 6-8 Carter Bryant, out of Corona Centennial (California).

The games between the two rivals will be Feb. 1 in Tempe and March 4 in Tucson. Arizona won both meetings a year ago.

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