Nebraska's Aleks Maric (21) blocks the shot of Oregon's Joevan Catron (50). Nebraska stunned Oregon, 88-79, Dec. 15 in Omaha, Neb., en route to an 11-2 nonconference record.

Lincoln, Neb. ? At a school that hasn’t won a conference championship in 58 years and has never won an NCAA Tournament game, an 11-2 record in January should be cause for celebration.

Not so at Nebraska, whose best start since 1994-95 has come against a schedule that ranks 331st out of 341 teams, according to collegerpi.com.

Some say the Cornhuskers will find out just how good they are -and how far they’ve come under second-year coach Doc Sadler – when No. 3 Kansas (15-0) visits at 8 p.m. Saturday.

But Sadler says his team can’t afford to put too much emphasis on its Big 12 opener, especially when it’s against arguably the best team in the nation.

“Where we finish in the league,” he said, “will be the measuring stick.”

The season’s high points are wins of 62-47 over Arizona State and 88-79 in overtime over then-No. 16 Oregon. The Huskers also own a 63-51 win over Rutgers, giving them a 3-0 record against BCS schools.

They’ve played just twice on the road and lost both times, at Creighton and Western Kentucky.

“If you look at most programs like us that haven’t had much success, that’s five pretty tough ball games out of your 13,” Sadler said. “I’m happy we’re 11-2. I do think we’ve got some quality wins, but we’re by far not even close to being where we need to be to be competitive in the Big 12.”

The Huskers have fattened themselves with lopsided wins over the likes of Presbyterian, Alabama A&M, Norfolk State, Alcorn State and Maryland-Eastern Shore. All are below 300th in various RPI indexes, which rank teams on performance and strength of schedule.

Another win came over a North Carolina Central squad that is in the second year of the five-year transition to Division I from Division II.

Nebraska has done what it’s supposed to do against those teams and rank second nationally in scoring defense (53.5 ppg) and field-goal defense (35.1 percent).

Center Aleks Maric is averaging 16.2 points and 8.4 rebounds, shooting 61.2 percent and blocking 2 shots a game.

Three of the top six scorers are newcomers. Ade Dagunduro, averaging 11.4 points, has been a spark. Steve Harley comes off the bench to average 6.6 points. And freshman point guard Cookie Miller has made his mark on defense, making 2 steals a game.

Dave Hoppen, who played at Nebraska from 1983-86 and is the school’s only 2,000-point scorer, said he likes everything Sadler is doing.

“For Nebraska to try to compete with the Kansases every year is just going to be difficult because Kansas is getting McDonald’s All-Americans every year and we’re getting a guy like Aleks Maric every eight to 10 years,” Hoppen said. “They have two or three Aleks Marics who can put up big numbers every year.”