It’s a long, long way from March to December and the two Big 12 Conference basketball teams that reached the NCAA Final Four last March appear to have taken divergent paths into December.

Oklahoma has lost only to No. 1-ranked-and-unbeaten Alabama while Kansas already has dropped three games — to North Carolina and Florida in New York City, and to Oregon in Portland, Ore.

Consequently, Oklahoma now is the team to beat for the conference championship, even though Kansas was the preseason choice to repeat. In retrospect, KU’s preseason ranking by the coaches and media was curious in that Oklahoma lost only one starter (Aaron McGhee) and Kansas lost two (Drew Gooden and Jeff Boschee).

Those prognostications must have been based primarily on the fact Kansas had two potential first-round NBA draft choices returning in Nick Collison and Kirk Hinrich while Oklahoma had none. OU’s best players, Ebi Ere and Hollis Price, both are projected as second-round NBA selections.

Anyway, one member of the national college basketball media has gone so far as to label Kansas a troubled team. “It’s a little bit of a stretch to say the Jayhawks are in trouble,” penned Robyn Norwood of the Los Angeles Times, “but they are by the standards in Lawrence, Kan.”

Depends, I guess, on how you define troubled. For instance, my definition of a troubled team is one torn by internal strife, and I’ve seen no evidence of that. The only trouble Kansas has had has been caused mostly by Hinrich’s bad back. When Hinrich wasn’t healthy, the Jayhawks sagged. If it’s troubling that coach Roy Williams has a thin bench, then you can call the Jayhawks troubled.

Oklahoma, by way of contrast, has a deep bench. Not a single Sooner is averaging more than 30 minutes a game while Kansas has four players logging 30-plus on the floor. But the Sooners can’t match the Jayhawks on inside firepower.

OU coach Kelvin Sampson’s best in-the-paint producers are senior Jabhari Brown and freshman Kevin Bookout. Neither is averaging in double figures. Meanwhile, KU has the league’s most potent 1-2 inside punch in senior Collison and soph Wayne Simien.

Oklahoma has been relying almost entirely on wingmen Ere (19.9 points a game) and Price (17.4) for offense. Then again, OU didn’t make the Final Four last year because of its offense. The Sooners’ defense was — and still is — deadly. Who can forget the championship game of last year’s Big 12 Tournament? OU made Kansas, an offensive juggernaut, look like a high school team in posting a 64-55 victory in Kemper Arena.

Quannas White may be the prototypical Sampson player. White is the Sooners’ point guard and he doesn’t scare anyone when he shoots. This season, for example, White is shooting a dismal 27.9 percent from the floor. Still, White plays Velcro defense and his assist-to-turnover ratio is a glossy 4.5-to-1.

On paper, Oklahoma is the same team as last season with one exception. Bookout, a touted 6-foot-8 high schooler from Stroud, Okla., who was wooed by Kansas, has replaced McGhee, OU’s leading scorer (17.4) and rebounder (8.1). It may be oversimplifying, but basically that’s it. Bookout for McGhee. Incidentally, Bookout is OU’s third-leading scorer (9.4).

Kansas, as you know, filled its two starting-lineup vacancies quite nicely by promoting super-subs Simien and Keith Langford.

So is Oklahoma really the team to beat in the Big 12 now? Or will Kansas rise from the heap of its perceived November-December ashes and cut down the nets again? From what we’ve seen so far, Oklahoma appears to have the edge based on depth and schedule (the KU-OU regular-season game is in Norman).

Still, few will remember in March what the perceptions were in December.