KU Basketball: The Journey to 13 Straight Big 12 Conference Titles
By trevb
The Journey to 13 Straight
Title Number Eight: 2011-2012 Season
With the departure of the Morris twins, this team would be seriously underestimated by everyone.
Incoming changes to the roster would be junior Kevin Young and freshman Naadir Tharpe. Kansas got labeled as 13th in the nation by the preseason AP poll. They would end up playing eight teams from the Top 25 AP poll and go 5-3.
This is also the final season of the entertaining rivalry of Missouri and Kansas in the Border War before Missouri would leave for the SEC (which has gone swimmingly for them in basketball). In the final game of the Border War, the game would go to overtime and Kansas would escape with a one point win.
Kansas would head into the Big 12 Tournament beating Texas A&M in the first round and then would lose to Baylor by nine points.
They would keep the Big 12 streak alive contrary to what everyone predicted and achieve much more with it. On Selection Sunday, Kansas would be drafted into a two seed in the Midwest region. They would experience close games in the second round by tenth seeded Purdue and 11th seeded North Carolina State in the Sweet Sixteen.
In the Elite Eight, Kansas would go on to beat number one seeded North Carolina and they would beat number two seeded Ohio State in the Final Four. KU basketball made it all the way to the final game, would lose to the John Calipari led Kentucky Wildcats.