photo by: AP Photo/Bethany Baker

Kansas guard Zeke Mayo (5) drives to the basket as Utah forward Caleb Lohner (11) defends during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game, Saturday, Feb. 15, 2025, in Salt Lake City.

Provo, Utah — In the aftermath of Saturday’s surprise 74-67 road loss to Utah, the Kansas men’s basketball team did not have its usual refuge of an immediate trip back to Lawrence.

The Jayhawks stayed overnight in Salt Lake City with a plan to practice at the Utah Jazz’s facility on Sunday, engage in some team bonding and then make the move down to Provo on Monday ahead of KU’s game against BYU on Tuesday night.

With the way the Jayhawks struggled against the Utes, did head coach Bill Self regret that they weren’t going straight home?

“I’m not a fortune teller,” he said on Saturday. “I don’t know what’s best. I think financially it’s far better to stay out here than charter another plane back and another plane here. It’s the smart thing to do and if we’re playing on (Saturday)-Tuesday again out here I guarantee we’ll do the same thing.”

Whether any aspect of the trip was ultimately beneficial may be borne out on the court Tuesday at 8 p.m. Central Time, as KU makes its first visit to the Marriott Center, now the highest-attendance Big 12 venue, in 65 years.

The Jayhawks have sunk to their lowest ranking in the AP poll in four years as they now sit at No. 23.

The Cougars, meanwhile, are coming off a resounding 80-65 home victory on Saturday over what had been one of the hottest teams in the nation, Kansas State. BYU limited the Wildcats to 27.3% shooting in the first half, and on the night held KSU’s Coleman Hawkins to six points and eight rebounds with zero assists and four turnovers, while outrebounding K-State 41-31.

Guard Richie Saunders, a peripheral contributor on last year’s team and one of several key holdovers who stayed in Provo through the coaching change to former Phoenix Suns assistant Kevin Young, has developed into the Cougars’ leading scorer. Against K-State he scored 16 points and grabbed a season-high 14 rebounds. On the season, Saunders is a 42.4% three-point shooter and makes half his shots from the field overall. BYU, as a whole, is the highest-percentage shooting team in the Big 12.

Other returnees from last year’s squad, which stunned KU in Allen Fieldhouse on Feb. 27, 2024, include guards Trevin Knell, another high-volume outside shooter, and Dallin Hall, who led the way for the Cougars with 18 points in that upset victory, along with physical forward Fousseyni Traore.

Russian freshman Egor Demin is a probable lottery pick in the 2025 NBA Draft. The 6-foot-9 point guard averages 11 points and 5.5 assists to 2.8 turnovers per game. Fellow first-year addition Kanon Catchings, another potential pro and the nephew of WNBA great Tamika Catchings, adds 8.2 points.

The only other player to start as many games this year as Saunders is Keba Keita, a 6-foot-8 forward from Mali whose 7.6 boards per game put him among the league’s top rebounders.

photo by: AP Photo/Ashley Landis

Brigham Young center Keba Keita (13) shoots against Houston forward J’Wan Roberts (13) during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game in Houston, Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025.

photo by: AP Photo/Rob Gray

BYU guard Egor Demin (3) reacts to a play against Arizona during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game Tuesday, Feb. 4, 2025, in Provo, Utah.

photo by: AP Photo/Ashley Landis

BYU forward Richie Saunders (15) looks to pass from the floor during the second half of an NCAA college basketball game against Houston in Houston, Saturday, Jan. 4, 2025.

The Jayhawks have been reasonably strong defending beyond the arc in recent games — after the Utes’ early surge on Saturday, they went 3-for-20 the rest of the night — but should be prepared for an entirely different level of bombardment in Provo. BYU jacks up 28.5 3s per game, which is 22nd in the nation and leads the league, with Saunders, Knell, Catchings and Demin the highest-volume shooters.

Perhaps the biggest contrast between KU and BYU right now is recent form. The Cougars have won six of their last eight games, including three on the road. The Jayhawks have alternated wins and losses since Jan. 22 and are at arguably their lowest point all season, at least since the new year, after the grim defeat at Utah.

Both KU and BYU now sit at 8-6 in league play, two games out of the fourth-place spot that earns an additional day off in the Big 12 tournament.

BYU Cougars (17-8, 8-6 Big 12) vs. No. 23 Kansas Jayhawks (17-8, 8-6 Big 12)

• Marriott Center, Provo, Utah, 8 p.m. Central Time

• Broadcast: ESPN

• Radio: Jayhawk Radio Network (in Lawrence, KLWN AM 1320 / K269GB FM 101.7 / KMXN FM 92.9)

Keep an eye out

Shattered on the glass: In a loss that was difficult to explain, likely the biggest factor in the Jayhawks’ stumble at Utah was defensive rebounding. KU allowed the Utes to corral 16 offensive rebounds, including four in one key sequence late in the second half when they at one point were tied 60-60 and had just 1.5 seconds left in the shot clock, a stretch that also resulted in forward KJ Adams fouling out. It may have been an aberration for KU, which is generally one of the Big 12’s better rebounding teams, but it also spoke to the general lethargy of the Jayhawks’ performance on Saturday.

Slow getting going: On that note, the Jayhawks entered halftime against Utah with considerable momentum after trimming an 11-point deficit to two. But when they emerged from the break, they let the Utes stretch it back to seven points in the first four minutes. This typifies a larger trend for KU: its point differential in the first four minutes of the second half, over its last seven games, is minus-29. Just one game in that period has seen the Jayhawks emerge from those early minutes in a better position than they were before: In the win over Iowa State on Feb. 3, they extended their lead from 16 to 20 points.

Possible ill effects: Guard Zeke Mayo only missed one minute and 28 seconds after hurting his left leg late in the Utah game and was a reasonably active participant in the Jayhawks’ offense when he returned, but Tuesday will provide a clearer demonstration of how healthy he’s feeling. Recall that Adams briefly returned after dislocating his shoulder in Ames, Iowa, on Jan. 15 and then missed the next three games.

Off-kilter observation

Next year’s KU-BYU games may be under much higher scrutiny. The Cougars’ incoming freshman AJ Dybantsa is the consensus top prospect in the nation, and KU’s Darryn Peterson is, at least in 247Sports’ rankings, right behind him. The two recently went head to head in a game on Feb. 8 in which Dybantsa scored 49 points but Peterson put up 61 and the game-winning 3-pointer.