Kansas has opened the season with two wins and plenty of optimism, but there’s already one issue that could hang around if it doesn’t get cleaned up fast: free throws.
The Jayhawks rolled past Middle Tennessee State 89-45 last night for their second victory, and the roster looks as deep as any Bill Self has had in Lawrence. There’s a blend of veteran production and young talent that has fans feeling good about where this team is headed. Still, the numbers at the foul line are hard to ignore.
Through two games, KU is just 28-for-52 from the stripe, a 53.8% mark. If that pace sticks, it would land near the bottom 20 nationally. That’s a sharp drop from last season, when Kansas set a program single-season record for free-throw percentage.
The early sample is small, and the percentage should climb. But there’s also a real chance this becomes a recurring headache. Self has had teams in the past that struggled at the line, even some of his best ones, and after last year’s historic shooting from the stripe, this was supposed to be a thing of the past.
The biggest concern starts with Tyran Stokes. During the preseason, he was getting to the line almost 13 times per game, but he’s only making 57.1% of his free throws so far.
Even so, this isn’t just one player dragging the group down. It’s a team-wide problem, and as people online have pointed out, Melvin Council Jr. and Taylen Kinney are the only qualified Jayhawks shooting better than 70% at the line.
That matters because Kansas isn’t built to back away from contact. The Jayhawks have plenty of players who can attack the rim and earn trips to the foul line, and that’s a major part of how this offense works. They’re not suddenly going to become a jump-shooting team.
They also don’t need to be elite from the stripe to win in the Big 12. The 2022-23 national championship team finished at 72.0% for the season, and that was enough to cut down the nets. Players like Council, Tre White, and Leroy Blyden Jr. have lifetime free-throw percentages above 75%, so there is some balance in the roster.
But not everyone has a track record of fixing this. Trey Kaufman-Renn is at 62.7% for his career, Christian Reeves at 62.2%, and Dennis Parker Jr. at 61.7%. Those numbers suggest some guys may not make a big leap.
And with KU’s first two games coming against low-level mid-majors at home, the spotlight only gets brighter now that Kentucky in the Champions Classic is next week. Self and his staff have a clear item on the to-do list: get everyone locked in at the line, every day, before that one.
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Leipold is 30-40 overall at Kansas, and the financial realities make any quick reset a complicated proposition. His buyout would be $17.9 million if he were fired after Dec. 1, 2026, while the school is also navigating a major stadium construction project that adds another layer to every decision. For a program trying to move forward, the question is no longer just whether change is needed, but whether Kansas can even afford the kind of change some fans may be demanding. [Read more 🡒]