Will Kansas Jayhawks be a No. 1 seed on Selection Sunday? Bill Self, top expert say so
Following their 74-65 win over Texas Tech in the Big 12 Tournament championship, all signs indicate that the Kansas Jayhawks will have a prestigious No. 1 next to their name when the men’s NCAA Tournament bracket is revealed on Sunday.
“I mean, I’m not an expert,” Kansas coach Bill Self said Saturday night, “but there’s no way we’re not a 1 seed.”
Gonzaga (26-3) and Arizona (30-3) have been locked in on the top seed line for some time now. The question for the last few weeks has been who the other two teams should be.
Auburn (27-5), Kentucky (26-7) and Baylor (26-6) were eliminated in their conference tournaments before the final game. Prior to tipoff between the Jayhawks and the Red Raiders on Saturday, ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi projected KU as a No. 1 seed. That should be all but set in stone now.
If the Jayhawks are a top seed, it’ll be their ninth No. 1 in the last 18 seasons the tournament was played under Self (the 2020 event was canceled). The last time they got on the coveted top seed line was in 2018, when they went lost to eventual national champion Villanova in the Final Four.
Ochai Agbaji, the Big 12 player of the year and the conference tournament’s most outstanding player, isn’t too concerned with the seeding, though.
“That doesn’t mean anything in the grand scheme of things, in the tournament,” Agbaji said.
As for the fourth No. 1 seed, Self said it should be Baylor — and Lunardi’s bracketology says the same.
Kansas is likely to be assigned to the Midwest Regional and play its first- and second-round games in Fort Worth, Texas. The Bears are also projected by Lunardi to wind up in Fort Worth for the first weekend. The Midwest Regional semifinals and final are in Chicago.
The Jayhawks’ fate will officially be revealed during the selection show, which will air at 5 p.m. Central time Sunday on CBS.
“We have to be ready to play no matter what seed we are,” KU’s Christian Braun said. “Those numbers don’t matter going into the tournament. You see it every year. So we are just going to focus, lock in and get ready to play whoever we play.”
This story was originally published March 12, 2022 at 7:32 PM with the headline "Will Kansas Jayhawks be a No. 1 seed on Selection Sunday? Bill Self, top expert say so."
