Week 5 did a lot to muddy the Big 12 picture, and that’s exactly what makes this league such a headache to sort out. Baylor turned in the weekend’s loudest performance, Iowa State and West Virginia staged a shootout for the ages, and the ranked teams that won still had to work for it. By the time the dust settled, the conference looked less like it had a clear front-runner and more like it had a crowded pack of real contenders.
Start with Baylor, because the Bears made the kind of statement that sticks. They went to Arizona State and came away with a 55-19 win, a road demolition that immediately pushes them into the conversation.
Baylor is now 2-0 in conference play, and the only blemish on the record is that one-point Week 1 loss to Auburn, when the Bears missed a two-point conversion in the final 10 seconds. That’s a brutal margin, and it leaves Baylor sitting there with the kind of résumé that demands attention.
If Baylor’s win was the most dominant, Iowa State and West Virginia gave the Big 12 its most entertaining game so far. The Cyclones beat the Mountaineers 45-42 in Ames in a game that kept flipping on its head.
Iowa State led 21-14 at halftime, then stretched it to 28-14 on the opening drive of the second half. West Virginia answered by clawing all the way back to tie it 28-28 before the third quarter ended.
The fourth quarter turned into a full-on track meet, with five lead changes. Iowa State grabbed the lead at 31-28, the two teams kept trading touchdowns, and the Cyclones finally finished it off with a score and 1:57 left.
That kind of game changes how you look at a team, and it also says plenty about the league as a whole. Through five weeks, nobody has pulled away. No Big 12 team has made itself impossible to ignore, and even the ranked teams had to survive some tense moments on Saturday.
No. 10 BYU won, but it had to navigate a messy weather game at TCU.
No. 12 Texas Tech beat Colorado 29-7, yet the Red Raiders were trailing 7-3 at halftime and only up 12-7 going into the fourth quarter.
No. 22 Houston also had to dig out of a hole, falling behind UCF 10-0 at the break before rallying for a 27-17 win that stayed tight until the final two minutes.
There were other teams making noise, too. Arizona looked sharp in a 34-7 win over Cincinnati in the Big 12 After Dark game of the week. Kansas followed its overseas trip with a 55-0 win over Middle Tennessee State, brushing off any concern about a post-trip letdown.
Put it all together and the league feels deep, not top-heavy. At this point, it looks like there are at least six teams with a real shot at making a run in the Big 12 race.
Week 6 opens on Friday night with Iowa State heading to BYU. Both teams are coming off emotional wins, which makes this one especially interesting.
BYU survived in rough weather last week, while Iowa State just came out of that wild one with West Virginia. The team that has the most left in the tank could have the edge, and BYU gets the nod at home under the lights in front of its crowd.
Arizona also hits the road this week, traveling to West Virginia after its strong home showing against Cincinnati. The Wildcats enter as a field-goal favorite, but Morgantown is not an easy place to carry that momentum. That should be one of the better games on the slate.
Houston faces another test as it heads to Manhattan to play Kansas State. The Wildcats are coming off a bye and looking to bounce back from their first loss under head coach Colin Klein, and they’re favored by a field goal despite Houston’s ranking. The Cougars will need a cleaner start than they had against UCF if they want to keep their spot among the conference’s top teams in 2026.
Then there’s Utah, which hosts Kansas in Big 12 After Dark. The Jayhawks are fresh off that dominant win, while Utah comes in rested after a bye.
On paper, this is a game the Utes should control, and anything less than a double-digit win would be disappointing. Still, Kansas has shown it can make things uncomfortable if it hangs around long enough, and Utah has a chance to reinforce its place near the top of the conference.
Several Big 12 teams are idle this week, but the league still has plenty to offer as conference play keeps heating up.
In Other News...
Richie Saunders Still Waiting On His First NBA Deal For One Reason
Richie Saunders path to the NBA has taken an unusual pause after the Memphis Grizzlies selected the former BYU standout with the No. 32 pick in the 2026 draft. He has not signed a contract yet because he is still working back from a torn ACL, and Memphis is expected to ease him in with a two-way deal once the paperwork gets sorted out.
For now, the situation is tied up in the realities of roster math as much as recovery. Two-way contracts come with their own financial structure, and the Grizzlies are carrying more players than the standard limit, which means they will need to trim the roster before opening night before Saunders next step can fully come into focus. [Read more 🡒]
BYU Heads Into Iowa State With Two Huge Questions Up Front
Kalani Sitakes injury update left BYU with a familiar kind of late-week uncertainty, this time centered on the backs and defenders who have helped shape the Cougars recent stretch. Running back LJ Martin and linebacker Isaiah Glasker are doubtful for the trip to Iowa State after getting hurt against TCU, while slot cornerback Cannon DeVries appears likely to be available after exiting early in the last game.
For BYU, the bigger concern is how to piece together the offense if Martin and second-string running back Sione Moa are unavailable. The Cougars are expected to lean on a committee approach in the backfield, which puts more pressure on the depth chart as they head into a road game where every available playmaker matters. [Read more 🡒]
BYU Just Rewarded Key Staffers Behind Its Recent Rise
Kevin Young is making sure the staff behind BYUs recent climb gets its due. Brandon Dunson has been promoted to associate head coach, while Jordan Brady is now an assistant coach and will continue serving as the Cougars director of player development, a structure that reflects how much of the programs growth has come from continuity and development as much as from on-court results.
Those moves come after a run that has included NCAA Tournament appearances and a pipeline of players reaching the NBA Draft, with both Dunson and Brady playing notable roles along the way. BYU also added seven new graduate assistants as it keeps building around Youngs vision, and the next big checkpoint on the schedule is the 2026-27 opener against Ohio State. [Read more 🡒]