Big 12 season thread ('24-'25)

[12au]

The season begins officially on Monday morning.

But already there have been some televised exhibitions. Arizona has had two. Last night they beat Cal State LA 82-53. Not sure how hard foot was on gas, but not sure that's a great result. That team is Massey 374--a true scrub's scrub.

Kansas St has an exhibition tonight.

 

[Stagnant]

Under the radar conference.

I have Arizona state season tickets. I hope they can compete a little better in this new and imo weaker conference.

 

[12au]

Some observations from yesterday:

• Kansas State looks great
• Utah's machine continues
• Arizona doesn't seem like an upper-tier team
• More of the same for Texas Tech. Can't imagine Chavez walking into that
• Colorado was in a dogfight at Laramie. Formann was out w/ an injury

Thoughts on today:

Interested in what TCU's rotation looks like. They have a bunch of highly touted players so not sure what pecking order is

 

[mred]

Not much to say about Iowa State yesterday. They played one of the worst teams in Div I (Chicago State) and scored the first 29 points of the game. The rest of the game was a bit sloppy as ISU tried all sorts of different combinations on the court, winning 96-56.

All 11 healthy ISU players played between 15 and 23 minutes.

 

[12au]

Kansas beats Lindenwood (Massey 333) 56-43. Basically only 2 returners from last year, one of which (Mayberry) didn't play

 

[nwhoopfan]

Nice debut for Delaney Gibb with BYU yesterday. Led them w/ 17 points, several key defensive plays in the last couple minutes. BYU blew a 16 point lead against a completely rebuilt Idaho team (only 2 returners from last year and a new coach). Cougars pulled it out, but second half was ugly. Only scored 25 after having 42 at halftime.

 

[12au]

UCF beat Megan Duffyless Marquette. I think UCF will be better this year, but not sure by how much. They have legit talent on paper

 

[KnightBridgeAZ]

Arizona has the potential to be really good. But we won't know until conference season. The coach made a decision to play virtually all lousy teams (except a tournament) in the OOC part of the schedule. I am baffled, her claim was that playing a harder schedule doesn't help seeding, which I don't agree, and the Big 12 is not as strong as the PAC was, in my opinion.

But having seen them close up, they do look very talented. Very deep with talent, and Adia is taking advantage of the weaker competition to play a lot of different players. And the one thing I always liked about Adia, she says outright what needs to improve, there was a list after Tarleton State, including turnovers and giving up points in the paint.

Another - unsaid- point is that they are going to need to adjust to a different style of refereeing. The PAC had very strong characteristics in the way games were refereed, and this year there are a lot of new faces calling games quite differently.

 

[ISUnorth]

TCU got a huge game from Sedona Prince (40 MIN 31PTS 16 REB) in taking down #13 NC State 76-73. Van Lith had 11 assists but is still bricking threes.

Interesting that the TCU starters played 180 minutes of the 200 minutes. Not seeing that as sustainable and maybe a bit odd considering their injury plagued 2023-24 season.

 

[ISUnorth]

University of Northern Iowa upset #8 (not #8 for long) Iowa State in Cedar Falls this evening, Panthers played some inspired and great basketball after losing their conference first team Grace Boffeli to ACL this week. Panthers got 37 points from Maya McDermott.

​

 

[visitingcock]

I realize that Iowa State’s loss was early and to a competitive in state rival. Upsets happen in such games and we should weight this loss from that perspective.

However, let’s assume that we need to anoint a new Big 12 favorite. At this point, is it KStste? TCU? WVU? One of the New Comers?

 

[Stagnant]

Maybe I am being a prisoner of the moment. But I like Kansas state and West Virginia the most out of the big 12 teams.

 

[darrell]

I realize that Iowa State’s loss was early and to a competitive in state rival. Upsets happen in such games and we should weight this loss from that perspective.

However, let’s assume that we need to anoint a new Big 12 favorite. At this point, is it KStste? TCU? WVU? One of the New Comers?

I might be on the TCU bandwagon.

 

[ISUnorth]

I realize that Iowa State’s loss was early and to a competitive in state rival. Upsets happen in such games and we should weight this loss from that perspective.

However, let’s assume that we need to anoint a new Big 12 favorite. At this point, is it KStste? TCU? WVU? One of the New Comers?

The Big 12 coaches pre-season actually picked KSU as the favorite. Wasn't by much but they did edge out ISU in the vote.

So far only two of ballyhooed transfers have panned out. Kenzie Hare was on restricted minutes early (injury) but has generally played well as has Sydney Harris. Lily Hansford has really struggled, hasn't even scored yet this season. Transfer backup post Lilly Taulelei has barely seen the court, injury earlier and now maybe just buried on the bench.

ISU is quite overrated at #8 and won't be in the top 10 next week. IMHO they are more like a #16 until they show they are better than that (or worse). UNI's double teams, sometimes triple teams, really frustrated post Audi Crooks. Cyclones overpowered the previous cupcakes on the schedule but a couple of those cupcakes showed that ISU is pretty slow. Some of those quicker players didn't have the hoops skills to go with their speed. UNI Panther's Maya McDermott had the hoops skill to go with her speed/quickness and repeatedly burned ISU.

 

[Stagnant]

I might be on the TCU bandwagon.

Too superstar dependent for me.

I am surprised they beat nc state though.

 

[12au]

Too superstar dependent for me.

I am surprised they beat nc state though.

I haven't watched much of TCU yet, but I will say they have good depth on the perimeter. Hailey Van Lith/Connor/Hunter/Bigby/Agnes is a good rotation. And Scherr will presumably return from injury. They do seem a little small at the 4, unless they play Roberson/Prince at the same time (which seems worse on offense). Prince's rim protection should offset the small 4 tho. I feel like Agnes can hang a bit at the 4 anyway.

 

[triaddukefan]

Well at least one Big 12 team showed up this week

 

[TheFarmFan]

Well at least one Big 12 team showed up this week

Where's your conference allegiance, sir?!

 

[Stagnant]

Good win for the big 12. Because they were not faring too well in these matchups with other power 4 schools.

 

[triaddukefan]

Where's your conference allegiance, sir?!

I didn't want TCU to show up.... I got no love for the toads, but I got to give them credit when credit is due.