Red Raiders vs Jayhawks: Game Predictions

It's the championship game of the Big 12 Men's Basketball Championship Tournament, and the Kansas Jayhawks have advanced by defeating the West Virginia Mountaineers and the TCU Horned Frogs.

On the opposite side of the floor today are the Texas Tech Red Raiders, a team that destroyed the Iowa State Cyclones in the quarterfinals before barely pushing past the Oklahoma Sooners in the semifinals.

It's a matchup of the #1 offense in the Big 12 against the #1 defense in the Big 12. Which one will win out? Will the Jayhawks continue to operate at that extra gear that they seem to have found in the postseason? Or will Texas Tech find a way to slow them down and do just enough on the offensive end to take home the hardware?

Our crew gets together to tell you what we think you can expect to see today.

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Kyle Davis: The Jayhawks are the healthiest they’ve been in a long time and everyone is contributing. I’m not sure they will have as easy of a time as the first two games of this tournament, but don’t underestimate the extra rest Kansas has gotten compared to a Texas Tech team that got taken down to the wire less than 24 hours earlier. If KU can continue to get the same contributions out of the bench (all-tourney-team candidate Mitch Lightfoot plus Remy Martin and Joseph Yesufu), I think it’s able to secure the title and a one seed in the NCAA Tournament.

Kansas 72, Texas Tech 68

Brendan Dzwierzynski: Simply put, the Jayhawks are rolling right now, and I’m more confident in them than I am in Texas Tech after seeing that slog of an offensive game the Red Raiders played on Friday. Give me Kansas locking up aone seed for certain.

Kansas 71, Texas Tech 65.

Lucas Murphy: The Kansas Jayhawks are going to the ship! Well the Big 12 tournament championship. Kansas will take on a well-rounded, competitive Texas Tech Red Raiders team. Kansas appears to have found their postseason gear and are playing very well. One player who has stepped up in a big way is Mitch Lightfoot, who even nailed a 3-point shot. The Jayhawks need to keep up this momentum heading into this game. A victory could also determine whether KU lands one of the four No. 1 seeds in the March Madness tournament.

Kansas 83, Texas Tech 78

Derek Noll: My #analysis is that I picked KU to win the whole tournament back on the preview post, so now that they’re in the final, I’m not picking against them. I still don’t see what everyone loves about Texas Tech, at least from an offensive perspective, so I’m going to take KU bigger than most others will probably predict. Magically, my wider margins of victory have come true in this tournament so why stop now? Kansas wins the tournament and secured that one seed in the Big Dance.

Kansas 81, Texas Tech 68.

Andy Mitts: To Derek’s point, the offense for Texas Tech is nothing special. In fact, it’s buoyed significantly by the way the defense plays, able to force turnovers which lead to quick points on the other end.

But that offense still has lots of problems with committing turnovers, something that the Jayhawks were inexplicably unable to take advantage of in the prior two meetings. After watching them force 11 turnovers against West Virginia and 18 against TCU, I get the feeling that forcing turnovers won’t be a problem for Kansas today.

The emergence of Mitch Lightfoot has come at the perfect time for this team, especially since both he and David McCormack struggled in both meetings this season. Add in that the Jayhawks now have three different point guards that can operate at least somewhat efficiently, and I’m not sure exactly how Texas Tech is going to be able to handle Kansas offensively. And I haven't even started talking about Agbaji, who's fantastic games have been overshadowed by the unexpected emergence of Lightfoot and Martin. Give the Jayhawks removing any doubt of whether they should get a #1 seed on Sunday.

Kansas 79, Texas Tech 69