These days, Kansas basketball fans have even more reasons than usual to root passionately against fellow historic heavyweights Kentucky and North Carolina.

Kentucky poses the biggest threat to KU’s desire to get sent to the Midwest regional in St. Louis, so every Wildcats loss increases the chances of Kansas holding onto its No. 1 overall seed.

The competition Kansas is engaged in with North Carolina has no significance in the Jayhawks’ desire to reach Indianapolis, site of this year’s Final Four. If players and coaches are aware of the race, they certainly don’t waste any time thinking about it.

Still, it’s worth mentioning, if for no other reason than to highlight just what remarkably different paths the superpowers have taken this winter.

North Carolina, which has lost six of its last seven games, needs two more victories to reach the 2,000 milestone and has four regular-season games remaining. Kansas also has four games left and stands four victories shy of 2K.

It’s tough to say which school has the advantage, but if UNC can’t win at home against Florida State on Wednesday, give the edge to Kansas. After that game, the Tar Heels travel to Wake Forest for a likely loss and play host to Miami on March 2, a likely victory.

Kansas (26-1) and North Carolina (13-12) both wrap up their regular seasons on March 6. If Kansas goes 3-0 heading into that day and Carolina goes 1-2, both teams will gun for all-time victory No. 2,000 at their chief rivals’ courts.

Kansas plays at Missouri at 1 p.m., North Carolina at Duke at 8 p.m.

Defending national champions tend to get gutted by early defections to the NBA, so it’s not unusual to be denied a chance to defend the title, but nobody forecast this precipitous a drop-off for UNC. Certainly, nobody could have predicted Williams would compare his team’s poor play to the Jan. 12 earthquake in Haiti that caused an estimated 230,000 deaths. Williams recounted a conversation he had with a massage therapist in which she told him his season was a disappointment, the earthquake in Haiti a disaster.

“I told her that depends on what chair you’re sitting in,” Williams said. “It does feel like a catastrophe to me, because it’s my life.”

The fallout from that remark intensified the unhappy ending to Williams’ worst season since his first at KU. When he later basically said that he took himself out of context, it didn’t undo the damage.

Heavy is the head that wears the crown. Two-time defending national champion Florida failed to make the tourney in 2007.

North Carolina’s collapse this season shines a light on just what a remarkable reloading job Kansas did a year ago. After losing Brandon Rush, Darrell Arthur, Mario Chalmers, Darnell Jackson, Sasha Kaun and Russell Robinson, the Jayhawks went 14-2 in Big 12 play, made it to the Sweet 16 and held a late lead against a Michigan State team that made it all the way to the title game.

Now, with just one player, Sherron Collins, who logged more than four minutes of playing time in the overtime victory against Memphis in 2008, Kansas is ranked No. 1 in the nation.