Tom Keegan: KU boasts blend of youth, experience

Freshman center Udoka Azubuike delivers a powerful dunk during a KU camp scrimmage on Wednesday, June 15, 2016 at the Horejsi Athletic Center.

Unlike in professional sports, in college the general manager of a program never needs to worry about the coach back-stabbing him by blaming him for roster shortcomings.

In college, the coach is the GM. In the case of Kansas basketball coach Bill Self, he has no reason to blast the GM because Self wears that cap as well as he wears a whistle.

Assembling a balanced, deep roster is a greater challenge in today’s one-and-done, hyper-transfer era than ever before, yet Self always manages to pull it off. Kansas has had either a No. 1 or 2 seed in 9 of 10 NCAA tournaments, starting in 2007. The Jayhawks were seeded third in 2009 after five players went in the 2008 NBA draft.

Self and his assistants do it by making sound talent projections on players who aren’t one-and-done talents and mixing them with McDonald’s All-Americans.

That makes KU’s rosters a blend of players who bring mature physiques, emotions and basketball minds with loud talents who boast high ceilings.

“Usually, if you look at perennial top-five type teams, not necessarily national-championship teams because (Jay Wright-coached Villanova) won it last year with some vets, but usually your foundation is your older kids, but your most talented players are your younger ones,” Self said.

This season’s center position for Kansas models that winning formula.

Nigerian native Udoka Azubuike, a 7-footer who has shed 25 pounds to get to 275, said he won’t turn 18 until Sept. 17, 2017. Two seasons in, Landen Lucas, 23, had experienced 107 minutes of game action.

“Udoka is better than advertised, but he’s just so young,” Self said. “He’s going to be terrific. He’s just so young. And having a guy (Lucas) six years older than him teaching him every day is definitely going to help him.”

I asked both centers the same question: Who’s stronger? Their answers revealed their ages.

Azubuike laughed and said: “I don’t know. I’m not going to sit here and tell you … I don’t know. We both are physically strong.”

What he didn’t know was whether it was appropriate for him to answer a question comparing himself to a teammate. It was the first time he was put in such a situation, so he hesitated, a natural freshman reaction.

Lucas smiled and said: “I would say I’m stronger. I believe 100 percent in my strength and ability to use it. He’s probably more of a physical presence, just because of his body and size, but because of my old-man strength, as some people say, I’d pick me in that one.”

They’ll make each other stronger.