Bruce Weber throws shade at OU and Texas, predicts bright future for Big 12 basketball
Kansas State coach Bruce Weber has a question for anyone out there who doubts the Big 12 will remain one of the nation’s top men’s basketball conferences after Oklahoma and Texas depart for the SEC.
“How many times have Oklahoma and Texas won the Big 12 in basketball in the last 10 years?” Weber said. “I think it’s a pretty easy answer.”
Indeed. Neither the Sooners nor the Longhorns have been championship contenders in men’s basketball lately. Texas hasn’t won a regular season Big 12 title since splitting the crown with Kansas in 2008. Oklahoma hasn’t been at the top of the standings since it shared a conference trophy with Kansas in 2005.
Four teams have won Big 12 championships since the conference’s two flagship football schools accomplished the feat, though Texas did win the last Big 12 Tournament in Kansas City.
“They’ve been great,” Weber said. “What Lon (Kruger) did at Oklahoma, every year they were good. Obviously, Texas and Shaka (Smart) had a good run, won the tournament last year, but who has won the Big 12? Kansas (11), K-State (2), Texas Tech (1) and Baylor (1), those schools are all there. We got Oklahoma State, who has had a great run. We have still got good basketball schools. I think we’re in good shape.”
Weber felt confident enough about the future of Big 12 basketball to throw some shade on Oklahoma and Texas after the conference announced its expansion plans.
BYU, Cincinnati, Houston and UCF will all be competing in the Big 12 no later than the 2024-25 season, and Weber has several reasons to believe those new members will add to the league’s hoops prestige rather than subtract from it.
“You have got some pretty good basketball teams,” Weber said. “BYU has had success and has been in the NCAA Tournament. Obviously, Cincinnati has had really good success. You had Houston in the Final Four. If you look at it, we got two Final Four teams in Baylor and Houston, so that part is good. UCF had a pretty good run, and they were in the NCAA a few years ago, played Duke in that crazy game and I think everybody watched it.”
Houston, currently led by Kelvin Sampson, has reached the Final Four six times, including last season when it lost to eventual national champion Baylor in the national semifinals.
Cincinnati has twice won the national championship and has a history of winning conference championships.
BYU reached the NCAA Tournament last season and has gone as far as the Elite Eight four times in its history.
UCF is the weakest new basketball member of the bunch, but it did reach the NCAA Tournament in 2019 and fell one point shy of knocking off Duke in the Round of 32.
K-State has met both BYU and Cincinnati in the NCAA Tournament in the recent past, with the Wildcats outlasting Jimmer Fredette and the Cougars in the second round of the 2010 tournament and the Bearcats beating K-State in the opening round of the 2017 event.
Unlike in football, Baylor and Kansas are sticking around to carry the Big 12 flag on the hardwood. Adding four new teams that care about basketball won’t leave many questioning the conference’s credentials. But Oklahoma and Texas did both reach the Final Four as Big 12 members, so the incoming teams will have some moderately big shoes to fill.
College basketball statistician Ken Pomeroy agrees that the Big 12 is on solid footing.
His data shows that the Big 12 has been, on average, the nation’s best men’s basketball conference after you remove Oklahoma and Texas from the results and replace them with BYU, Cincinnati, Houston and UCF.
That came as no surprise to Weber.
After coaching in both the Big Ten and the Big 12, there is no doubt in his mind which conference plays the best basketball ... with or without Oklahoma and Texas.
“I don’t like change. I love where our league was,” Weber said. “I’ve always said when people have asked, ‘What’s the best league?’. It’s the Big 12. It’s a fact and in basketball, especially. We’ve been so good, and I didn’t like to change, but life is about change and flexibility and dealing with new things. To get those teams is a positive.”