Mountaineers the mystery team in the Big 12

WVU selected to place 13th in Big 12 poll; Kansas first

MORGANTOWN -- They are the mystery basketball team in the Big 12, but then again, isn't West Virginia supposed to be the mystery team?

The conference put out its preseason poll and preseason awards on Thursday and WVU was voted 13th in the 16-team league.

Why not 12th? Why not 14th? Why not 8th?

Like who knows how good (or how bad) this edition is going to be?

Certainly that's the attitude that new coach Darian DeVries brings into the season. Asked just a couple of hours before the poll was published about his expectations – he claimed he hadn't been informed yet of the voting -- and he kind of said what everyone is thinking:

Preseason polls are a joke.

OK, if you're being picked 13th, it's not a very funny joke, but about the only thing you can predict at this time of year with the Big 12 is that Kansas will be picked first.

They always are, always should be.

They're Kansas, the Jayhawks. They have the best players. They have the best coach. They have the best arena. And yes, sorry Mountaineers, they have the best fans.

Where else are you going to put them?

As to DeVries' view of the preseason prediction for WVU, his reaction even without seeing it was this:

"I didn't see us in any of the Top 10 rankings," he began. "I don't know where they will have us. Preseason rankings are even harder now than they've ever been with the portal and things. I don't put a lot of stock in it. A lot of time last season's rankings are based on last year's team, who you have coming back."

For the record, WVU has one returning player, Ofri Naveh, the Israel import who joined the team late, then played an average of 339 minutes for the season, averaging 2.6 points a game.

Like you ain't tell much from that.

"For us, we're a team nobody's seen," DeVries went on. "I don't think you can give us a ranking. There's a lot of teams like that. Until you start playing games, you can't figure out who has got what and, for us, that's all that matters."

Truth is, I'd challenge any Mountaineer fan, no matter how rapid, to name the entire roster right now, or the assistant coaches.

So how do you put any weight on whether they are as good as Arizona State, better than Colorado, worse than Utah?

For the record, here's the way the poll came out. You be the judge of what it's worth.

Preseason Big 12 Poll: Kansas (9 first-place votes) – 215 points; Houston (5) – 211; Iowa State (1) – 194; Baylor – 185; Arizona (1) – 179; Cincinnati – 140; Texas Tech – 135; Kansas State – 133; BYU – 116; TCU – 90; UCF – 83; Arizona State – 64; West Virginia – 62; Oklahoma State – 46; Colorado – 37; Utah – 30.

We all can agree that it's a good league and that Kansas and Houston belong at the top. And as for Iowa State, Baylor and Arizona, we kind of know what they are capable of doing.

But WVU isn't on the national radar right now until it proves otherwise and, as we say, Kansas is Kansas.

They have the choice for Preseason Player of the Year in Hunter Dickinson, the only unanimous all-league selection.

Interestingly, this year WVU has a player who knows what it's like to be playing for Kansas (and Drake and Washington State and about to play for West Virginia) in the much traveled Joseph Yesufu.

He was asked what makes Kansas Kansas.

"The atmosphere," he answered. "The people demand winning. If you don't win, you came up short. They don't believe in runner ups. You either win it all or you failed that season. That puts … not pressure on our backs, but we knew we had to come every day."

One thing is certain, if you are a Jayhawk, you are hated in every arena you play in except at home.

That didn't get to Yesufu.

"I loved Kansas," he said. "Great community, great teammates, great coaching staff. That's my alma mater. I graduated from there. So there's no blood with them. I loved being there."

But when others don't feel that way"

"In a way it's kind of fun. Going into a game you know no one's on your side at all. You are going to get everybody's best. There's always a target on your back. You have to be prepared every night," he said.

That's a message he can bring to his newest team in Morgantown, a team without an identity and who will be trying this season to establish that they are better than 13th in the conference.