Let’s skip ahead to the ending, briefly. We haven’t ever seen Bill Self soak up a win like this in the regular season. It’s a massive, massive moment — his team has bought fully in, and wanted it so much more than Arizona, who lost for the first time this season. Arizona is really good, this is far from the last we’ll be hearing about Arizona, a huge, balanced team that plays a style tailored to the roster. This is about the 2025/26 Kansas Jayhawks, who keep surprising us.

Early along, the L’s were stacking. Peterson out again with almost no notice, again, we’ll get to that a bit. The first four or five minutes… woof, it looked like we were going to get smoked down low all night. The Jayhawks had to come up with an answer, maybe a little faster than they were expecting to.

But the Jayhawks fought, and fought, and fought. Despite giving up a lot of size — I’ve never seen Flory look smaller against an opponent — KU was the aggressor all night. Outside of Brayden Burries (who looks awesome, has to be rising into the top 5 pick convo), Arizona could not respond to KU’s physicality. They were Shook. The blueprint for KU winning this game is specific, and they executed during every high leverage play. It was truly a special night in the Phog, an instant all-timer.

A few posts will (probably) come out of this game, and the narrative and trajectory, especially in the case of freshman forward Bryson Tiller, for this team has changed. I hope he’s negotiating his NIL package to return right now.

There are concerns. Our Vibes Champion Melvin Council went 6/25. Tre White (-5) flopped, though he hit important free throws late — they’re going to have to consider playing small with Elmarko Jackson more (+5!). Jamari McDowell continues to be a hallmark glue guy and the latest gamer guard Self seems to pump off an assembly line when things are going well. Flory Bidunga played with a chip on his shoulder, continuing a run of truly excellent defense and fearless rim attacks. Yeet!

The smoke around the DP situation is growing thicker and thiccker, however, this might be the first time KU has leverage over the situation. They just popped a clear title contender right in the chops without him, and without being to prepare for his absence. This is one of the wildest sagas in KU history, and that’s saying something. What happens now? With an away game at Iowa State looming Saturday, it’s an important few days for the program.

Let’s not ruin this post with “critical thinking.” Soak it up — that was a special evening at the Barn, maybe one of the most evocative regular season wins of the Self era. Walk around with a little juice today. More soon, because there’s just so much to unpack. Rock. Chalk.