Kansas guard Josh Jackson (11) tosses up a shot after losing his footing during the second half, Saturday, Jan. 14, 2017 at Allen Fieldhouse. At left is Oklahoma State guard Davon Dillard (24).

Kansas basketball coach Bill Self said this week that his Jayhawks probably would be pretty upset with him if he limited their minutes in Saturday’s regular season finale at Oklahoma State.

Senior forward Landen Lucas said Self would be correct.

“Yeah, we would be kind of disappointed,” Lucas said. “Just because we want to win. It’s, for some of us, our last Big 12 game, we take pride in it and we don’t want to lose any momentum. That’s probably the biggest key going into these last couple games.”

With Oklahoma State having completely turned around its season — from an 0-6 start in Big 12 play to its current 9-8 conference record — the top-ranked Jayhawks (27-3 overall, 15-2 Big 12) are fully aware of what type of challenge awaits them in Stillwater, Okla.

That understanding, along with their general desire to win every time they take the floor, provides enough motivation for the Jayhawks in a game that many on the outside see as meaningless.

“We just want to get better,” Self said. “We’ve been in this situation before, where we haven’t probably closed the season out the way we’d like to, based on, you know, maybe clinching beforehand. But this is a time where I just hope our guys go down there with a free mind, just play, and love to play with each other and know that that time is coming to an end and we just want to make it last as long as we can and make the most out of each opportunity.”

In the eyes of Lucas, who was a key player on a team that experienced a similar challenge last season, that’s precisely the approach he wants his team to take. And he does not believe that motivation will be a concern in this game or any other game in the coming weeks for this Kansas team.

“That’s on the guys who were here the last couple years to make sure that we stay motivated just because we understand how important momentum is going into the tournament, how important confidence is,” Lucas said. “You don’t want to go into the tournament, even if you are a 1 seed, coming off a couple of losses or bad games. We want the same momentum we had last year going into the tournament because that helps us through a couple rounds and getting us to a game like Villanova, where, at that point in time, it’s just a couple possessions and anything can happen.”

To that end, Self said he planned to treat the regular season finale as business as usual for the Jayhawks and did not have any plans to rest KU’s starters more than normal.

“We’re going to play six guys the vast majority of the minutes, and the seventh or eighth guy some depending on how they are doing. It’s not going to change,” said Self, emphasizing how many days off the Jayhawks will have in the next couple of weeks. “With that much time off, I don’t think taking them out and playing them five less minutes in a game will impact them at all. I think it will be the same regardless. We’re going to play to try to win and I think our guys would be really disappointed in me personally if they thought that I was doing anything different.”

Added Lucas, when asked if he were starting to feel nostalgic about the season winding down: “I’m just trying to take it in, game by game, day by day. It’s not a huge deal for me at the moment, but I know, looking back on it, it will be so I’m just trying to embrace it all.”