……..which four teams do you think get the double byes in the B12 Tourney?

Making my call:

No surprise choices:

Kansas
Iowa State
Baylor

Slight surprise choice:

Cincinnati [solid team, decent schedule, opponents face hard travel].

Tech

[really favorable schedule, nice new pieces, 2nd year in system, addition by subtraction…….same record as Cincinnati but loses tiebreaker and gets 5th seed]

Left Out:

Houston [tough schedule & losing Shead is too much to overcome]
Arizona [tough schedule & traveling East is much harder than traveling West]

The other nine schools aren't very close.

Would be a guess based on current rosters as of today.
ISU
KU
BU
UCF (sleeper pick)
Side note I think BYU, OSU, CO, ASU will all be bad squads.
Houston will be overrated. Shead was their heart beat. The heavy lifting is now on Cryers shoulders. He will fold like a pretzel

I still think Houston might have a good year. Their coach knows what he's doing. It's just a gut feeling and could be totally wrong.

Kansas, Baylor, Iowa State, and either Houston/Cinci

I agree with you.

Baylor, Kansas, Houston and Kansas St.

If we finish any lower than 2nd with the roster we have then this team will have severely underachieved. Barring any injuries of course.

Better question is which one of the four double bye teams is likely to lose their first game when they finally play. Our history is not good in a XII tournament.

NCAA tournament is more important. We need to get to the second weekend in March, preferably the Elite 8.

historian said:

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NCAA tournament is more important. We need to get to the second weekend in March, preferably the Elite 8.

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I agree, but it can't be good that our performances in our conference tournament has been historically not good. Starting out slow in the conference tournament, to me, is either a lack of focus or not being able to continue consistent basketball at a high level when it comes time to enter the win or go-home time of the season. It could be a mindset that is behind the curtain regardless of which tournament it may be and could explain some of our head-scratching exits in the first round of the NCAA against seemingly inferior competition.

We lost against OSU in the big 12 tourney during our Natty year. Not a priority for CSD and no relevance to how we do in the tourney that actually matters. The only time a conference tournament means anything is for those teams who need to win it to gain an outright bid, or those teams that are on the bubble and need at least 1 quality win. If that were ever the case, our performance would be quite different.

You keep saying this, but there's nothing to support that. It's a personal opinion and that's fine.
We've sucked in KC since Drew took over for the most part. So I don't buy that one bit.
And we're not exactly lighting it up in the big dance either…. In fact the last 3 years you won't find a team whose underachieved more than us relative to seeding. That's with some very very favorable draws. We haven't made the 2nd weekend in almost a decade excluding the title year. That's unacceptable if you want this team viewed as one of the top programs in the country.

Drew has actually commented along those lines as well about the relative unimportance of the conference tourney, so not just my personal opinion. You can agree or disagree with Drew's approach to the conference tourney, but the proof is in the pudding. We don't prioritize it. If we did our results would be better.

Do we prioritize the Dance? Those results have been piss poor. What's your excuse for sucking in that tournament outside of 21?

IowaBear said:

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You keep saying this, but there's nothing to support that. It's a personal opinion and that's fine.
We've sucked in KC since Drew took over for the most part. So I don't buy that one bit.
And we're not exactly lighting it up in the big dance either…. In fact the last 3 years you won't find a team whose underachieved more than us relative to seeding. That's with some very very favorable draws. We haven't made the 2nd weekend in almost a decade excluding the title year. That's unacceptable if you want this team viewed as one of the top programs in the country.

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Your wording suggests there was a downturn with Drew. As we won exactly 4 tournament games in the 6 years prior to Drew, we haven't had success in the Big 12 tournament, period. Great efforts in 2009, 2012, 2014 but not a lot since then. I think there may be a number of reasons that factor into it. We were a tired team in 2021 and losing early in the Big 12 was the best thing that could have happened to us in KC. Never a good situation to be in when you are the favored team going into a conference tournament when you are a lock for the NCAA and you face a talented team that needs to win to keep playing. It might also help if we have some fans in the arena but that's not going to happen.
As for our seeding underachievement in NCAA last 3 years. You are right. We weren't good enough last 3 years, although a healthy 22 team would have made a lot of noise in my opinion. Last 3 seasons do not in any way give me doubts to Drew and co. being able to put together a deep run when the cards are right. I would also love to see us finally win a Big 12 tournament, but that is never going to be number one on my wish list, so...

My wording is referencing the last decade or so. I thought that was pretty obvious my apologies there. We've severely underachieved relative to seed especially the last 3 years. We're coming up on a decade with only 1 second weekend appearance. Granted that includes the ultimate prize which is a natty.
I'm not dissing Drew or anything of that nature. Just pointing out the facts. As far as conference tournaments when I hear Drew physically say they purposely crap the bed in them than I'll put stock in that take. I do agree that they aren't all that important right now as we've been solid locks the last half decade. But I don't see why we wouldn't head to kc with a winning mindset. The reality is your program is based solely on tournament success fair or foul. And if we keep underachieving relative to seed you can't say BU is an elite program. 2nd rd exits are not the sign of an elite program. Again I'm not dissing Drew in any way shape or form and I know a few will put words in my mouth as though I'm downplaying the success.
I agree with pretty much everything you're saying. Just adding my opinions. Not that they mean much.

IowaBear said:

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My wording is referencing the last decade or so. I thought that was pretty obvious. We've severely underachieved relative to seed especially the last 3 years. We're coming up on a decade with only 1 second weekend appearance. Granted that includes the ultimate prize which is a natty.
I'm not dissing Drew or anything of that nature. Just pointing out the facts. As far as conference tournaments when I hear Drew physically say the purposely craps the bed in them than I'll put stock in that take. The reality is your program is based solely on tournament success fair or foul. And if we keep underachieving relative to seed you can't say BU is an elite program. 2nd rd exits are not the sign of an elite program. Again I'm not dissing Drew in any way shape or form and I know a few will put words in my mouth as though I'm downplaying the success.

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I agree with a lot of what you say. I think the dirty little secret is we are not really an elite program--at least not when we compare our success to the history, attendance, fanbase,etc. of literally everyone else you might call elite. We have a program that at this moment arguably recruits elite, and we have a team that plays from year to year at or below the elite level, excepting a couple of years when we were the "boss of bosses." I will undoubtedly have my oscillations between euphoria and despair this year, but I appreciate and enjoy the run we are still on. I could care less if the talking heads on ESPN think we are elite or not.

Oh I agree! The run Bu is on is incredible when you consider the programs history. I'm just hoping we can find a way to make some deeper runs in the coming years. Will certainly have the talent to do so.

Just win, baby

Baylor, duh
Kansas
Houston
Tech

Drew has actually explicitly mentioned this a few times throughout the years. Doesn't mean he's trying to lose but he isn't that mad if he doesn't win. He's okay with the extra rest based on his comments.

That was particularly true in the natty year, at least according to all the pundits. It makes sense: the long covid pause late really took a lot out of the team. They needed time to get back up to strength and to practice. Losing to OSU in KC was a blessing in disguise so that the team was fully prepared for Indianapolis. The rest, as the say, is history.

Granted, 2021 was a very unique set of circumstances but the logic of it makes sense after the intensity of Big 12 play for two solid months. And we no longer have the SEC game to interrupt that gauntlet. Also, the Big 12 is tougher & better without the traitors because of the addition of Houston & Arizona. Cincinnati & UCF provided some surprises last season too.

Point me to directly to Drew's quotes saying he's intentionally losing these games. That's my point. We don't go to KC to lose. No sane coach does. He may not value that tournament as much. That's way different than saying we play to lose.
But again point me directly to these quotes and I'll put stock in what you and another are saying.
The extra rest if that's true isn't exactly helping if that's the case.

IowaBear said:

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Point me to directly to Drew's quotes saying he's intentionally losing these games. That's my point. We don't go to KC to lose. No sane coach does. He may not value that tournament as much. That's way different than saying we play to lose.
But again point me directly to these quotes and I'll put stock in what you and another are saying.
The extra rest if that's true isn't exactly helping if that's the case.

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This thread got me thinking about the Big 12 tournament. I admit I am not a fan of the tournament, the venue which makes it always an away game for us. I agree that no way no how is Drew writing off the tournament or not trying to win every game on the court.
When I was a teenager, I remember reading a book on John Wooden. In the 10 years or more prior to the UCLA championship run, his team would dominate the conference and end up with a quick exit for the NCAA tournament. Wooden and his coaches finally determined their practice and player rotation was physically wearing out their guards by the end of the season, and credits the changes made with that first NC win (after that nobody was playing 40 minutes on the Alcindor/Walton teams as they were normally up 30).

Drew has always leaned heavily on the key guards and typically shortens an already short rotation from Mid January on. Along with the issues above, we are more often than not a tired team come Big 12 Tournament time. You could argue everyone is tired, and that is to some extent correct. Not every team plays a short rotation, and some teams don't play every game to the wire. Over the years, I've seen some teams make a run in the conference tournament after pretty much taking the month of February off...

I agree! I'm not arguing that this tournament is super important. It's not, most years. However, this notion that we go up there hoping to lose for more rest is silly. Most teams have short rotations. TCU was probably the exception during the 23/24 season.
If we're going to basically pack it in during the B12's for extra rest it's reasonable to expect better results in the big dance. At least imo.

You just changed it. Never said anything about intentionally losing, that's completely different than not being overly mad at losing in that tournament.

I'll bow out though because I'm not going to look for it but certain this was addressed at least two separate times.

Only reason I remember bc I was surprised to hear it and seems others have too. I'll defer since I'm not taking the time to find it though.