KANSAS CITY, Mo. — After winning 88 games over his first three seasons at Arizona and picking up Top 10 preseason cred earlier this month, Tommy Lloyd could have swaggered his way into the Big 12 Men’s Basketball Media Day on Wednesday.
Instead, when the Wildcats’ coach walked onto the main interview stage, he chose a seat located far in the back. Figuratively, of course.
He didn’t complain, having already received a message of sorts when Arizona was assigned it’s inaugural Big 12 conference schedule. It ends with consecutive Saturdays of playing at two of the league’s toughest venues, Iowa State and Kansas.
Oh, and the Jayhawks won’t be making a trip to McKale Center because, well, because the league says they don’t have to.
“I’m not surprised one bit that Arizona is playing on the road at Kansas to finish the regular season in its first year in the Big 12,” Lloyd said. “When it came out, I kind of smiled. There’s senior coaches in this league, a lot of guys I really look up, and I have no problem with those guys calling the shots.
Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd addresses assembled media Wednesday at the Big 12 Men’s Basketball Media Day event in Kansas City, Missouri.
“We’re here to be part of it, and if Arizona has to play Kansas only once the first year, on the road at Kansas, so be it.”
Kansas coach Bill Self note that “maybe there is some scheduling favor to some teams just because it’s an unbalanced schedule,” but said it really didn’t matter in the Big 12 because it was so tough throughout.
“I can tell you, hands down, that this is going to be the hardest year to win our league,” Self said.
Four of those veteran Big 12 coaches that Lloyd referred to — Self, Houston’s Kelvin Sampson, Iowa State’s T.J. Otzelberger and Baylor’s Scott Drew — all have teams rated ahead of Arizona in the Big 12, while Kenpom has all of the conference’s 16 teams within its top 90.
It’s a conference that was rated the toughest in men’s college basketball last season before the Wildcats joined it. So as often as the league’s 16 teams used the word “excited” to describe the opportunity ahead the word “gauntlet” was also used.
Kansas coach Bill Self, left, chats with Iowa State coach T.J. Otzelberger, center, and Baylor coach Scott Drew Wednesday in Kansas City, Missouri, as part of the Big 12’s Men’s Basketball Media Day festivities.
And while Houston may have made the adjustment look easy last season by winning the conference in its first season after moving over from the AAC, there is no easy formula.
Just a few secret formulas that work to varying degrees.
“When you go through the year that we went through last year in this league, you take notes, you learn, and you try to adjust and apply the things that you learn,” said Cincinnati coach Wes Miller, who moved along with Houston from the AAC, then finished 11th out of 14 teams.
“We’ve done that. We have made some changes, but I ain’t telling you guys (specifics). That’s for me and my program.”
What is known about the Big 12 is pretty obvious: Deep, talented rosters, often supported by some of the wealthiest NIL collectives in college basketball. Passionate fans, and what is now almost coast-to-coast travel.
Again, Lloyd embraced it, noting that Pac-12 schools often didn’t have the sort of crazed sellout environments that are much more common in the Big 12. So did many of his peers, even the one expected to have the worst of it.
Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd addresses assembled media Wednesday at the Big 12 Men’s Basketball Media Day event.
“You look around and there’s so many historic programs, unbelievable venues — the pomp and circumstance that goes behind with (Big 12) fan bases is absolutely second to none,” said Utah coach Craig Smith, whose Utes were picked to finish 16th in the Big 12’s preseason coaches poll. “So we’re really excited to be a part of this thing. Obviously, we’re not picked where you want to be picked but there’s nowhere to go but up.”
Lloyd and Smith are being joined by ASU coach Bobby Hurley and Colorado’s Tad Boyle in moving from the Pac-12 to the Big 12 this season. But the change is only somewhat new for Boyle, who played at Kansas and coached Colorado during its last year in a previous Big 12 incarnation before moving to the Pac-12 in 2011.
“We’re coming into a monster of a league,” Boyle said. “The physicality and the style, the defense, is hard nosed.”
In one way or another, they’re all preparing for the change. Lloyd said most of offseason focus has been the Wildcats’ own improvements but noted that his staff has been seeing if there were “little themes on either side of the ball that we need to focus on.”
Big 12 coaches pose for a photo as part of the conference’s Men’s Basketball Media Day event Wednesday in Kansas City, Missouri. Pictured (from left): Bill Self (Kansas), Bobby Hurley (ASU), Tommy Lloyd (Arizona), Kelvin Sampson (Houston), Jamie Dixon (TCU), Grant McCasland (Texas Tech), Scott Drew (Baylor), Wes Miller (Cincinnati), Darien DeVries (West Virginia), T.J. Otzelberger (Iowa State), Tad Boyle (Colorado), Craig Smith (Utah), Steve Lutz (Oklahoma State), Kevin Young (BYU), Jerome Tang (Kansas State), Johnny Dawkins (UCF).
The three players he brought along with him to the media day — Caleb Love, KJ Lewis and Jaden Bradley — all said they were looking forward to the change.
“As hoopers, you want to play the best every night,” Bradley said.
At Utah, Smith said he began jumping in particularly after some new members of his coaching staff took a summer break to move fully into their new Salt Lake City homes.
“It was really quiet, and I just literally sat and watched every team in our league, three to four games of each team,” Smith said. “I really sorted everything out and did a mini report on every team.”
His findings could be seen as somewhat alarming, of course, and they were reflected in the league’s official preseason poll. While Arizona was picked only fifth after winning the Pac-12 last season, ASU was picked 12th while Colorado was picked to finish just ahead of Utah at 15.
“It’s a different brand than the basketball in the Pac-12 over the last three years that we’re used to, but it’s exciting,” Smith said. “It’s an incredibly physical league. You get a really defend and rebound. There’s not a lot of fouls called, and that’s not a good or bad thing. That’s the style of play. So you’ve got to be able to adapt and adjust to that.”
In some ways, Hurley already has tried to adjust. The Sun Devils lost to BYU and TCU last season, and are attempting to keep preparing in the nonconference season ahead by playing away from home for nonconference games with Gonzaga, New Mexico, Florida and UMass.
ASU is also playing at Duke on Sunday in an exhibition game that will take Hurley back to where he starred as a player.
“We want to get our guys accustomed for these road trips,” Hurley said. “I’m not sure any other power conference would play the little amount of home games (we have) so we should be battle tested on neutral sites and on road games. Hopefully that’ll pay dividends as we head into our conference schedule.”
Lloyd appears to be doing much the same thing. The Wildcats will play at Wisconsin on Nov. 15, host Duke a week later, then play in the Battle 4 Atlantis before meeting UCLA in Phoenix in December.
But, true to his usual form, Lloyd refused to look too far forward, to the Big 12 or anything else for that matter.
“We play at Wisconsin the third game of the year,” Lloyd said, when asked about the Wildcats’ Big 12 road games ahead. “I’m assuming that’s where you’re trying to get me to go. I’m fired up to play at Wisconsin the third game of the year.
“We got Point Loma coming in on Monday (for an exhibition game). And you know what? Point Loma is a great Division II program and I heard they just beat a Division I team in a scrimmage. So we’re going to be geared up. There’s no lack of respect for anybody.”
