Is the Big 12 the best basketball conference in the country? Not so far
The Big 12 came into the 2024-25 college basketball season with five of the top 10 teams in the country.
Most of the talk at Big 12 Basketball Media Day was about the new 16-team conference being the best conference, top to bottom, in the country.
"A lot of leagues are top heavy but they're also bottom heavy," Kansas coach Bill Self said at media day. "This league has no bottom. No matter where you go, winning on the road or not winning on the road will not be considered an upset in coaches' minds."
More than that, though, the Big 12 has a reputation for being the most physical conference in the country. No. 1 Kansas, No. 4 Houston or No. 6 Baylor might lose a game or two this season, but they will not be "out-toughed."
On the opening night of the season, that reputation took a significant hit.
Worst Loss in Scott Drew Era
Baylor marched into Spokane, Washington, on Monday night with one of the most talented rosters in the country. From 23-year-old Duke transfer Jeremy Roach to 19-year-old five-star freshman VJ Edgecombe, the Bears are loaded.
And they got embarrassed. On national television.
No. 8 Gonzaga dominated Baylor in every facet of the game — especially toughness — on its way to a resounding 101-63 victory on ESPN2. The 38-point margin was Baylor's worst loss in the Scott Drew era.
"For Baylor fans that stayed up, I promise that we will get a lot better, and we will give you a better effort than this," Drew said after the game.
From the jump, Gonzaga was the more physical team. They pressured the Bears on the perimeter and bullied them in the paint. The final rebounding tally? Gonzaga 45, Baylor 32. Points in the paint? Gonzaga 48, Baylor 36.
Any way you slice it, it was a reputational hit for the "physical" Big 12.
“We put 100 up today on a great team and kind of a scary team,” Gonzaga coach Mark Few said after the game. “I mean, they're really, really, really athletic and can do a lot of different things on the defensive end, mix it up. And I thought it was a game where they were switching every screen, which sometimes takes a little rhythm out of you.”
Payback for Gonzaga?
Gonzaga had some added motivation to bury Baylor on Monday.
The Zags lost to the Bears, badly, in the 2021 NCAA national championship game. And over the last year-plus, the Big 12 publicly flirted with adding Gonzaga as a conference member. The Zags lack of a football program proved to be too big of a hurdle, however.
Ultimately, the Zags joined the new Pac-12. And as Monday's result showed, they were probably ranked too low to start the season.
To be fair to Baylor, they lost four starters and are integrating several new players. Gonzaga only lost Anton Watson from its core and returns one of the most experienced rosters in college basketball.
“Fair to say Gonzaga, returning eight or nine [players], looked like that,” Drew said after the game. “And us, with one returning starter, looked like that.”
Big 12 Takes Hit in Bracketology Update
The national media paid close attention to Monday's result in Spokane.
In his latest Bracketology update, ESPN's Joe Lunardi bumped Gonzaga up to a No. 1 seed — and bumped five Big 12 teams down:
- Houston dropped from a No. 1 to a No. 2 seed in the South Region.
- Baylor dropped to a No. 4 seed in the South Region.
- Cincinnati dropped to a No. 6 seed in the Midwest Region.
- Texas Tech dropped to a No. 6 seed in the Midwest Region.
- BYU dropped to a No. 10 seed in the East Region.
With a 20-game conference schedule this season — and thus a shortened nonconference slate — the Big 12 needs to take advantage of every nonconference game vs. a top-ranked opponent. They are off to a rocky start.
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Ben Sherman has been covering the sports world for most of his journalism career, including 17 years with The Oregonian/OregonLive. One of his favorite memories was covering the 1999 Fiesta Bowl - the first BCS National Championship Game - at Sun Devil Stadium.