Bill Self heads into Kansas’ regular-season opener with more options than usual, and a few of them still come with legal fine print attached.
The Jayhawks’ deep roster - including Tre White, Melvin Council Jr. and Purdue transfer Trey Kaufman-Renn, whose eligibility remains tied to preliminary injunctions in lawsuits against the NCAA - gives KU a chance to mix and match when it meets Fordham on Monday night. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m. at Allen Fieldhouse, with the game airing on ESPN+.
The bigger question is how many of those pieces will actually matter once the ball is tipped.
“I don’t know,” Self said last week when asked about the early-season rotation. “We’d like to be able to play at least 10.
There will be some games we use 11, but the guys who play the 11th spot or more than that are going to get limited minutes no matter who that is. So I think 10 is a fair number, at least initially.”
That’s a notable shift from the exhibition run, where Self kept turning the dial. In KU’s 90-84 loss to Duke on Oct. 25, eight Jayhawks logged at least 10 minutes, with Christian Reeves playing six and Paul Mbiya four.
Against Louisville on Oct. 21, nine Jayhawks played 12 or more minutes, while Kohl Rosario added five. And in the preseason win over Pittsburg State on Oct.
16, Self used 12 players for at least 12 minutes apiece.
The starting five, though, is still something Self is sorting out. Tyran Stokes, White, Council, Reeves and Leroy Blyden Jr. got the nod against Duke, while Stokes, Council, White, Mbiya and Taylen Kinney started against Louisville.
“Whoever we think is practicing the best together, that’ll be how we’ll pick it,” Self said of Monday’s lineup.
He made it clear the trial phase is over.
“The time for experimenting on starting lineups is over. We’ll go with something and if that something doesn’t work out, then we’ll make changes. It’s not a coin-flip on who starts, like we did the first three exhibition games.”
One of the biggest choices for Self is whether to lean into size or speed. KU could go with two bigs from a group that includes 7-footers Reeves and Mbiya, along with the 6-9 Kaufman-Renn.
Or Self could stay small, the way he did in the second half against Duke, when 6-9, 225-pound Keanu Dawes handled the 5 spot alongside four guards. Reeves and Mbiya never played in the final 20 minutes.
“I thought if our guards rebounded, it would have gone really well,” Self said.
It didn’t. Duke controlled the glass 43-30.
Still, Self saw enough from Dawes to know the option is there.
“If we were better equipped on switching and weak-side help and attacking the ball when it’s in the air, things like that, we could have done better,” Self said. “But what we saw, Keanu’s matchup when a 5-man guards him plays to our advantage. I thought he did well.
“We don’t know exactly how to plug K.D. (Dawes) in yet offensively, but we saw that he can help us win just by being active defensively.
Where we would plug him in would probably be the same spots that Tre White would be plugged in. If he (Dawes) and Tre (6-7) and Tyran (6-8) are in the game at the same time, and then you put K.D. in the game, that’s three 6-8 guys.
“Somebody’s going to probably play out of position, or Tre could be the guy playing out of position if you go big. So it’s just some things we probably haven’t practiced enough to be good at.”
Fordham arrives as a much different kind of test than the Jayhawks’ exhibition opponents. The Rams were picked seventh in the 14-team Atlantic 10 preseason poll, while Duke was ranked No. 2 and Louisville No. 11.
Self said he’d like to see his team sharpen up before the opener, but he also acknowledged this group is still learning itself.
“Hopefully we can correct some things and be more prepared going into the game, but I wouldn’t say this team is the most prepared team we’ve had,” Self said. “I would say that the most prepared teams we’ve had are usually teams that return a lot of players.”
Kansas does return five players from last season’s 24-11 team: White, Council, Rosario, Mbiya and Will Thengvall.
And while the roster is still taking shape, Self likes what he has seen so far.
“Oh, I like them. I think they’re great,” he said.
“They like each other and I don’t think it’s coach-speak. I’ve been really impressed with some of the improvements that have been made.
“Tyran wants to be coached every day. He’s been great, but there’s still another level he can get to.
He got 27 (points vs. Duke) the other night and we ran one play for him and he missed a layup.
But other than that, we didn’t do anything to help him and we don’t really understand how to help him yet - what angles to screen for him, and get him with a downhill head start.
“I thought it was pretty impressive what he did against great competition.”
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