Marian Washington probably could have mailed in Tuesday night’s history-making loss.

No. 13-ranked Texas made sure Kansas University finished with the first winless Big 12 Conference women’s basketball season ever by coming alive in the second half and posting a 61-46 victory in Allen Fieldhouse.

“This game was a blueprint of many of our other ball games,” Washington said. “We play well for 20 minutes and then we lose steam.”

Tuesday night’s performance in the home finale was almost like a broken record. Kansas shot 48 percent in the first half and lagged by only two points (28-26) at the break, but then the Jayhawks shot 26 percent in the second half and were out of it before they knew it.

Final stats showed Kansas was outrebounded by 17, had no player score in double figures, committed 17 turnovers and on and on.

Kansas finished 0-16 in the Big 12. The Jayhawks never came any closer than seven points in any of those 16 defeats. They scored more than 59 points just once in those 16 outings.

“No one wants that kind of record,” said Washington whose 29th season as the Jayhawks’ head coach is her worst, by far. “This was a tough year to have to rebuild. It’s unreal with so many (Big 12) teams ranked. If this had been last year, it wouldn’t have been quite as glaring.”

Kansas was 12-17 last year, 5-24 so far this year and that begs the question: When will the Jayhawks be competitive again?

“I may be mistaken, but I don’t think the competition will be like it was this year,” Washington said. “I don’t expect it to take a lot of years.”

Washington lost the top three scorers off last year’s team and she’ll lose the top four scorers off this one. She’ll be counting heavily on seven recruits, but it’s difficult to win with freshmen.

Washington’s job is not in jeopardy, but it would definitely be in her best interests if her 30th team on Mount Oread at least showed promise. This one never did.

“People have been given four or five years (to rebuild) and I hope to do it in less than that,” Washington said. “We’ve brought in some fine young talent.”

Jody Conradt, who has been at Texas almost as long as Washington has been here  26 years  is a Washington booster.

“She’s done enough to have a season like this without undue criticism,” Conradt said. “If you’re in this business long enough, it cycles around. It took a lot of Marian Washingtons in the beginning to get women’s basketball going.”

For her part, Washington waved the flag.

“Women’s basketball is a major sport,” she said. “We have to get behind it, embrace it and respect it. I fought for the program here when no one wanted it, and I’ll still fight for it against people who still don’t want it.”

Washington has at least one more battle to fight this season a first-round game in the Big 12 Tournament at 2:30 p.m. next Tuesday in Kansas City’s Municipal Auditorium against the to-be-determined No. 5 tourney seed.

“There’s no pressure on us at all,” KU guard Selena Scott said. “Nobody expects us to do anything. I don’t mind who we get. We owe everybody.”

Notes: KU had two players on the 39-member All-Big 12 academic team (3.2 GPA or higher)  Nikki White and Leila Mengüc. KU’s Kristin Geoffroy earned a berth on the nine-member second team (3.0 to 3.19 GPA).  Geoffroy, White, Scott, KC Hilgenkamp and Katie Hannon were honored on Senior Night  Tuesday’s crowd was announced as 850.  The Jayhawks averaged about 1,800 fans per home game. In the Big 12, only Texas A&M drew fewer fans . Â