Bob Lutz: KU continues search for consistency in the NCAA Tournament

Kansas is this year’s box-of-chocolates college basketball team.

The Jayhawks were 15-0 at Allen Fieldhouse, continuing to build on the mystique and charisma of the 60-year-old barn.

But take Kansas out of Allen and the Jayhawks are 11-8. Now does that sound like an NCAA Tournament No. 2 seed?

Give KU credit for winning yet another Big 12 regular-season championship. That’s 11 in a row and it’s an amazing, incredible, almost supernatural streak. But for all the eerie forces at work for the Jayhawks inside Allen Fieldhouse, they’re often an inconsistent mess when they venture away.

And it’s away that Kansas will be this weekend to play in Omaha, where the Jayhawks are the highest-seeded Midwest Regional team not named Kentucky, which back in November beat KU 72-40 in Chicago.

It makes sense that an inconsistent team is made up of inconsistent parts, and some of the swings for a handful of KU players are wild.

Let’s start with sophomore guard Wayne Selden, who has been teasing fans with his athleticism and occasional hot shooting for a couple of seasons now.

The 6-foot-5, 230-pound Selden has a game that doesn’t often enough match his appearance. There are times when he’s so good. Take a five-game Big 12 stretch from Jan. 31 through Feb. 14, when Selden averaged 16 points, made 24 of 46 shots and was 17 of 29 from the three-point line. Those, folks, are All-American numbers.

But in KU’s next seven games, Selden made 11 of 42 shots and was 1 of 16 from three-point range. Hot to cold in a hurry.

Then Selden heated up again, scoring 20 and 25 against Baylor and Iowa State in the semifinals and finals of the Big 12 Tournament.

What game will Selden take to Omaha?

Next up is freshman whiz kid Kelly Oubre, who has size (6-7) and a sweet stroke. It took Oubre a while to figure out the college game and his playing time was sproradic in November. But over a nine-game stretch starting on Dec. 20, Oubre averaged 13.8 points and shot the lights out.

Then he went cold over KU’s next nine games, averaging 7.8 points before getting hot again and averaging 13.8 over the next eight.

In the Jayhawks’ last two games, both in the Big 12 Tournament, Oubre scored 12 points and made 3 of 9 shots. Will the real Kelly Oubre please stand up?

If you think Selden and Oubre have been inconsisent, wait until you get a load of 6-7 sophomore Brannen Greene.

There was a time this season – specifically during a seven-game stretch from Jan. 19 through Feb. 10 – when Greene was a force. He averaged more than 10 points in those games, made 22 of 37 shots and was 17 of 24 from the three-point line. Remarkable.

Whoever that guy was, though, has disappeared. And Kansas would love to find him.

The guy impersonating Greene for the past nine games is shooting 21.6 percent and has made 4 of 28 three-pointers.

The Inconsistency Blues have even infected point guard Frank Mason, one of the steadiest players in the country for most of the season. Mason hit double-figure scoring in 21 consecutive games from Nov. 27 against Rhode Island through Feb. 10 against Texas Tech. Not only that, he was doing dishing out a bunch of assists.

KU coach Bill Self couldn’t stop talking about Mason. Jayhawks fans adored him.

But Mason has missed double figures in four of KU’s past 10 games. He’s shooting just better than 35 percent from the field in those 10 and has only 26 assists in nine games since back-to-back eight-assist games against Texas Tech and Baylor in mid-February.

The inconsistency doesn’t stop there. Cliff Alexander was all over the place before KU held him out while the NCAA investigates an off-court eligibility issue, forcing him to miss the past six games. In four games before that, though, the 6-8 Alexander had six points and 12 rebounds.

Junior Perry Ellis is the one KU player who found steadiness until he went down with a sprained knee against West Virginia on March 3. Ellis was obviously feeling his way along in two Big 12 Tournament games, going 6 of 21 from the floor.

The wild fluctuations make it difficult to believe the Jayhawks can get on a roll in the NCAA Tournament. The talent is there, but there are too many guys in a constant state of flux.

KU’s best hope is that Selden, Oubre, Greene, Mason, Ellis and the other Jayhawks will put it all together. If so, Kansas can beat a lot of teams – in Lawrence or anywhere else.

This story was originally published March 18, 2015 at 9:50 AM with the headline "Bob Lutz: KU continues search for consistency in the NCAA Tournament."