So skilled as a basketball coach and so blessed with some of the most talented athletes and players in the country, Kansas basketball coach Bill Self rarely blinks when he gets wind of a movement to alter or re-emphasize existing rules that could create change in the college game.

Such was the case Tuesday at Sprint Center, where the Big 12 hosted its annual Media Day and Big 12 coordinator of men’s basketball officials Curtis Shaw explained some of the points of emphasis for the upcoming college hoops season.

The bulk of Shaw’s presentation focused on physical play in the paint.

“We put a new interpretation in this year that if contact occurs in the restricted area, even (if) it’s initiated by the offense and the defensive player doesn’t leave his feet and go vertical, it will be a blocking foul if the shot’s missed,” Shaw explained. “If he makes the shot and the contact’s not severe, we’re going to probably play through it. But (if) he misses the shot, we want a blocking foul every time.”

This initiative is no different than the one from a year or two ago that focused on similar contact on the perimeter. Back then, the season began with a ton of whistles and a lot of grumbling from fans and coaches alike. But then the players started to get it, the coaches started to teach it and the game adjusted.

“The results were good,” Shaw said. “Scoring went up over five points a game, but we only averaged over 1.1 free throws more. So it wasn’t just a free throw contest, the game was getting better.”

In time, that’s what Self believes will happen with the new emphasis in the paint.

“Will it be good for our game over time,” he asked. “I would say it probably will be. But, initially, there’s going to be some heartache and probably more so on the big guys than anyone else.”

KU forward Landen Lucas, a senior who last season made a name for himself by defending opposing post players with a little contact but no real harm said he was not going to worry too much about the new rule emphasis because there’s not much he can do to change it. Lucas on Tuesday said he would continue to play with his head as much as his body and rely on fundamentals and scouting reports to help him stop opposing players.

That’s the best way to approach it, according to Self.

“It’s going to be difficult to play the game and have your players be aggressive playing the game based on the way it’s supposedly going to be called,” he said.

A large part of the reason for these recent tweaks is to up the pace and get an element of wide-open offense back into basketball.

With that as the goal, Self elaborated on a few things he thought could change that would help that. Most of them came from his experience leading KU to the gold medal at the World University Games during the summer of 2015.

“I actually thought that was a better game to coach and play than the collegiate game,” said Self of the international rules. “In large part because of the clock and the offensive rebounding and how things are done there…. I do think we should extend the (three-point) line. I think the wider lane is fine. But I think what we really need to look at, if we want to have more pace, is when we get an offensive rebound or when there is a dead ball situation off a foul in the fourth quarter or whatnot, we don’t have to reset (the shot clock) to 30 (seconds). I wish we’d reset it to 20 or 18 or whatever it is. That way we can get back into action.”