photo by: AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez

Kansas head coach Bill Self talks with players during a timeout from play against TCU during an NCAA college basketball game in Fort Worth, Texas, Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025.

After his team came into Lawrence and found itself on the receiving end of arguably Kansas’ best performance of the 2023-24 season, Houston coach Kelvin Sampson said it was “sacrilege” for KU to be the underdog in any game, especially at Allen Fieldhouse.

“You challenge the Jayhawk pride, if you will, by telling them they are not favored,” he said.

The Cougars had entered the Phog, on Feb. 3, ranked four spots higher than the Jayhawks. They left with a 78-65 loss after KU shot an improbable 68.9% from the field.

UH went on to destroy the Jayhawks in the reverse fixture in Houston a month later. Now, with a very similar roster, the Cougars return to Allen Fieldhouse on Saturday night, once again the higher-ranked team.

Houston is No. 7 in the nation to KU’s No. 12, and that ranking may even be selling UH short as it has not lost a game since Nov. 30. The Cougars currently boast the nation’s top scoring defense and field-goal-percentage defense after demolishing Utah 70-36 on Wednesday and have allowed more than 55 points just once in a game since that last loss.

Granted, the one aberration demonstrates that Houston is vulnerable: At Addition Financial Arena, where KU won by 51, the Cougars needed a layup by J’Wan Roberts off an inbound with 1.1 seconds left to escape host UCF, 69-68. That was also one of just three road games Houston has played in its 11-game winning streak.

The Cougars’ personnel bears a strong resemblance to what they had when they earned a No. 1 seed last season. Houston lost Big 12 Player of the Year Jamal Shead to the pros but replaced him with a familiar face in Oklahoma transfer Milos Uzan (currently the Big 12 leader in assist-to-turnover ratio) and also returned players like guard Terrance Arceneaux and forward JoJo Tugler from injury.

The off-ball guard duo of L.J. Cryer and Emanuel Sharp continues to lead Houston on the offensive end, as both are averaging 13.8 points per game while shooting more than 42% from long range. (As a whole, UH shoots the best from beyond the arc of any Big 12 team, albeit on a fairly low volume of shots.)

“If you can keep the ball away from them at the end of the shot clock, I think that would probably be good for you,” KU coach Bill Self said, “because I think they’re great at creating shots for themselves under seven or eight seconds on the shot clock.”

Sharp missed Wednesday’s game with an ankle injury and is a game-time decision for Saturday, the Houston Chronicle reported.

Roberts is the Cougars’ other double-digit scorer and he, Tugler and Ja’Vier Francis form an undersized but physical forward group that imposes its will on opposing offenses with Houston’s so-called “monster” post double-teams. It’ll be a big challenge for freshman forward Flory Bidunga, slated for his third straight start with KJ Adams out injured, and particularly given that Self considers rebounding the top point of emphasis for his team this weekend.

“He’s just got to grow up fast,” Self said. “He’s got to play stronger, he’s got to play more physical, he’s got to enjoy it, embrace it, and he can’t be indecisive. When you go, you go. That’s the thing: Flory is very capable of having good games against really good players. That’s happened before … His role is obviously more important now when we’re a little short-handed that he needs to play to his size and play to a very athletic level.”

UH forces 15.0 turnovers per game while committing just 8.9; KU, meanwhile, has recently slipped to 11th in the league in turnover margin.

“You’re going to have to be able to attack and play behind their pressure, but they’ll mix how they do it,” Self said. “They guarded us much different down in Houston last year than they did here.”

Point guard Dajuan Harris Jr. echoed that sentiment and said he might have to figure out Houston’s plan for ball-screen defense over the course of Saturday’s game.

The work will begin even before the game starts, as KU will look to open in much better form than it did on Wednesday at TCU.

“Coach talked to us about it yesterday at film,” Harris said. “We need to do a better job with pregame routine before games, getting ready, just so we don’t have slow starts like that because if we have slow starts against Houston, they’re going to beat us by 20, 30 in our building.”

As big of a challenge as it will be for KU to take down the Cougars again at Allen Fieldhouse, the Jayhawks will have their work cut out for them later in the year when they make another late-season trip to the Fertitta Center on March 3.

No. 12 Kansas Jayhawks (14-4, 5-2 Big 12) vs. No. 7 Houston Cougars (15-3, 7-0 Big 12)

• Allen Fieldhouse, Lawrence, 5:30 p.m.

• Broadcast: ESPN

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

Keep an eye out

Crowd work: Self said he wasn’t trying to be negative, but he lamented what he sees as the lesser avidity of KU’s students this season, at least since North Carolina visited Allen Fieldhouse on Nov. 8: “I haven’t felt the student hype to the level that I’ve felt in some other years, and I know that other people have said the same thing.” The crowd for last year’s Houston game was as loud as any all year, on the level of UConn’s visit in December 2023 and UNC’s 11 months later; the fans may need to channel that same energy to bolster their team’s chances on Saturday.

One becoming two: The story of KU’s Wednesday night win was wing AJ Storr, who in the continued absence of Adams saw some of his most extended action of the season and rewarded the Jayhawks with his best performance of the year — 12 points, six rebounds and three steals. The key now for Storr is to sustain his momentum, which he has not done after past promising showings earlier in the season. Storr’s 16 points on 7-for-9 shooting against Oakland in November were immediately followed by seven on 2-for-7 from the field three days later. His encouraging signs in the second half at UCF came to nothing as he experienced the low point of his season three days later — again — against Arizona State when he went minus-7 in three minutes. Harris said of Storr, “TCU was like the stepping stone for him to keep performing good. If he keeps doing that, keeping his head straight, his mindset good, he’d be in pretty good shape.” If he could reproduce what he did at TCU against Houston, it would go a long way toward helping the Jayhawks compete for all 40 minutes.

New skill: The Jayhawks have looked quite formidable with Shakeel Moore in the starting lineup, but it’s been in large part because he helps ease the defensive burden on Dajuan Harris Jr. On Wednesday, though, he went 3-for-4 from beyond the arc to help KU polish off TCU after having previously been 2-for-9 on the year. That may not be a big part of Moore’s game, but if he can demonstrate consistency from range it will do just a bit more to create space for center Hunter Dickinson inside and give defenders pause when they want to swarm him.

Off-kilter observation

Uzan will be seeking his first victory over KU after losing to the Jayhawks in all four matchups during his two seasons at Oklahoma.