Losing Udoka Azubuike for the season due to a hand injury is obviously a huge blow for Kansas. When he was on the floor this season, Azubuike functioned as Bill Self's co-featured scorer alongside Dedric Lawson. Azubuike is a proven post scorer who's also a very good rim defender.
According to ESPN Stats & Info, the Jayhawks have been a whopping 0.10 points per possession better with Azubuike in the game so far this season, compared to what KU has done with him on the bench. To say he will be missed is putting it lightly.
Still, the fact that Kansas would be better with a healthy Azubuike doesn't mean the Jayhawks are doomed without him. In fact, there's reason to think that maybe all is not lost for KU. Anyway, we're about to find out: Kansas takes on TCU in Lawrence at 9 p.m. ET Wednesday on ESPN2.
Here's what to watch for from Self's team in its post-Azubuike remainder of the season.
We've already seen what "the rest of KU" looks like
Azubuike logged a total of 184 minutes before suffering his season-ending injury last week. The 7-foot junior recorded more than 28 minutes in a game just once in 2018-19.
To be sure, he plainly made the team better. But two additional things are true and, now, very important for Kansas.
First, at the risk of stating the obvious, Lawson also makes Kansas better when he's on the floor -- and the difference the Memphis transfer makes is larger than Azubuike's impact, according to the Box Plus/Minus stat at sports-reference.com. More on this in a moment.
Second, and even more importantly, KU has still been pretty good, on balance, in the 68 percent of minutes so far this season in which Azubuike has not been on the floor.
Yes, both of the Jayhawks' losses, to Arizona State and Iowa State, came when Azubuike didn't play. Then again, those dates happened to coincide with the only true road games Kansas has played so far this season.
The loss in Ames, in particular, was so lopsided (77-60) that the presence of Azubuike alone would almost certainly have made no difference. That's not necessarily good news for the Jayhawks going forward, of course, but it warns us against assuming that one player's availability determines all that follows.
Azubuike's secret sauce this season was still a work in progress
When we see a veteran of Azubuike's stature lost for the season, our tendency, unavoidably, is to imagine that player at the peak of performance. In this case, that peak perhaps came last season, when Azubuike was surrounded by a host of deadly 3-point shooters. He reveled in all the empty space in the post, and he made opponents pay. His 77 percent shooting inside the arc was one of the best such marks ever recorded in Division I.
This season, Azubuike's work load increased, and his 2-point shooting fell all the way "down" (air quotes) to 71 percent. That's still excellent, of course, but Self's big man was no longer forming half of a classic "pick your poison" dilemma for opponents. Kansas has made just 34 percent of its 3s this season. The real problem, such as it was in Lawrence, however, was that it wasn't necessarily clear that Azubuike was still KU's best option for post touches.
Yes, he's clearly tops when it comes to converting 2-point tries, but Lawson is far superior as a passer out of the paint. Most obviously, Lawson is shooting 78 percent at the line this season while drawing fouls at a rate equal to that posted by Azubuike. Since the latter is a 39 percent career foul shooter, however, Self had taken to keeping the ball out of his hands at the end of close games. In such situations, Azubuike was being used overwhelmingly if not exclusively as a screener.
Granted, there's no law that says you can't have two interior scorers, even in this 3-happy era, particularly if it helps your defense significantly. Still, putting two guys on the floor that don't shoot 3s (Lawson is 4-of-24 from beyond the arc this season) tends to makes your opponent's help defense that much more effective, particularly if one of those two guys isn't a good passer.
KU's roster gives Self options
Earlier I mentioned that Lawson is Self's best player so far this season in terms of Box Plus/Minus, which estimates how many points he adds or subtracts compared to an average player per 100 possessions. Then again, it might be better to say that Kansas has several guys that BPM likes very much. Lawson, Devon Dotson, Lagerald Vick and, yes, Azubuike are or were all off to strong starts. Now what?
We don't know whether Self will replace Azubuike's minutes by trying to stay "big," by going "small" or by some combination of both. If it's the former, it could mean more playing time for 6-foot-10 freshman David McCormack, a McDonald's All-American from Norfolk, Virginia.
(Nor, of course, do we know if Silvio De Sousa will be ruled eligible at some point by the NCAA. The 6-foot-9 sophomore's name came up last fall in testimony during the federal trial on corruption in college basketball.)
Conversely, if Self decides to go small, some portion of Azubuike's minutes could go to Marcus Garrett. The 6-foot-5 sophomore has already made six starts this season and is accustomed to playing as a wing. No, he hasn't made 3s yet (he's 4-of-22 this season), but Garrett adds value on defense and has recorded five assists on three occasions.
Lastly, Self announced this week that Ochai Agbaji will see immediate playing time. The 6-foot-5 freshman guard was previously slated to redshirt this season, but Azubuike's injury is giving Agbaji the opportunity to earn minutes when KU goes small.
If you're thinking that, big or small, Kansas without Azubuike sounds like a really tough defensive team that might struggle to score at times, particularly from the perimeter, well, welcome to the Big 12. Throw a stick at the league, and you'll hit five of those.
Again, losing Azubuike is a hit that lessens KU's chances of extending its streak of Big 12 titles. The question is how big that hit really is.
Just remember two things: One, the things Azubuike did best -- basically, interior scoring and defense -- have a fair degree of overlap with what his teammates can do, either individually or collectively. Two, Allen Fieldhouse is still Allen Fieldhouse. Don't bury KU just yet.