Kansas guard C.J. Henry grabs his bag as the team members exit the bus upon arrival to Oklahoma City outside the Sheraton Hotel in downtown Oklahoma City, Tuesday, March 16, 2010. Henry will play basketball at Southern Nazarene University in Bethany, Okla., this season.

Oklahoma City ? KU’s basketball players will be wearing white uniforms for as long as they play in the NCAA Tournament, and they’ll be looking forward to seeing plenty of blue every stage along the way.

First stop: The Sheraton in downtown Oklahoma City, where the team bus arrived Tuesday evening to part a relatively shallow sea of early-arriving fans sporting familiar Kansas T-shirts and other Jayhawk paraphernalia.

And the party’s just getting started.

“Awesome,” said Ryan Roberts, a 14-year-old KU fan from Perryton, Texas, as his hoops heroes filed by. “Really awesome.”

Welcome to the world of arriving in town as regular-season champion of the nation’s best conference, having won the Big 12’s postseason tournament and now entering the most important competition of all as the prohibitive favorite: No. 1 seed in the Midwest Region and the tournament’s overall top seed.

The formal work begins late this afternoon at the Ford Center, with an open practice to entertain spectators and an opportunity for the ‘Hawks to show off what they’ve been boasting all year: skill and depth at each position, key players who already have one national title, and an entire organization, campus and fan base driving to add a second in three years.

Shelby Showalter is certain of it, even if she hadn’t expected to be staying in the same hotel — the very same Sheraton — that would accommodate the Jayhawks for their tournament stay. A few steps away, Barry Hinson was handing out room assignments to players, coaches and support staff.

“I’m bringing them good luck,” Shelby, a 14-year-old lifelong KU fan, said. “I saw them when I was 7, and they went to the Final Four then, too. This is luck.”

The same could be said for Shelby and the rest of her girls-only spring break traveling party from Derby: mom Diane Showalter and friend Brady Nicholson, 14. They simply came to town for shopping.

The chance stargazing put a tidy bow on the packages.

“Hi there,” Coach Bill Self told them with a smile, on his way back into the hotel after addressing media questions outside. “How you doin’?”

Pretty well, thanks. Rock Chalk.

“That,” Shelby said, breaking out her iPhone and a sparkly case, “is going to be my Facebook update.”