Education

LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) ― Since America last saw Bill Self coach, he's authored his autobiography and met the President, raised millions for charity and become rich himself, accepted awards, handed out awards and crisscrossed the country so many times he was making appearances in New Jersey one day and Nevada the next.

Oh, yeah -- he also helped open a dry cleaning shop near his home.

Now that basketball season has finally arrived, maybe the high-energy Kansas coach can finally catch up on his rest.

"It was the busiest offseason I've ever had," admitted the 45-year-old Self. "But it was a good busy. It was also some of the most fun I've ever had.

"It's fun winning a national championship," he added with a grin. "I'd like to win a few more before I'm done."

Figuring Self should have an excellent chance of doing exactly that, his bosses moved aggressively before the NBA or some other big-time college swept away the popular young coach who in five years has averaged almost 29 wins.

A contract that'll pay about $30 million over the next 10 years, richer than many NBA deals, was agreed to just days after Mario Chalmers' historic jumper forced overtime and led to a 75-68 victory against Memphis in the NCAA championship game.

Now the pressure is on to win another NCAA title. Kansans, who take their basketball very, very seriously, would rather not wait 20 years for their fourth championship like they had to wait 20 years for their third.

It probably isn't going to happen this season. A return trip to the Final Four is probably also out of reach. The Jayhawks lost all five starters from their championship team. Chalmers, Darrell Arthur, Brandon Rush, Darnell Jackson and Sasha Kaun were all taken in the NBA draft.

That leaves only two who contributed much at all to the championship and the school-record 37 wins of a year ago -- guard Sherron Collins and center Cole Aldrich.

But coming in is a bevy of promising newcomers. That's something else Self did in his busy offseason -- sign one of the nation's best classes.

He managed to bring in the No. 1 and No. 3 junior college recruits in the country -- 6-foot-5 Mario Little of Chipola (Fla.) Community College, and 6-2 Tyrone Appleton from Midland (Texas) College.

Also in the fold are the Morris twins of Philadelphia. Markieff measures 6-10, 235. Marcus is 6-8, 225. When they're sitting next to one another, the heavily tattooed freshmen are tough to tell apart.

From New Jersey comes guard Tyshawn Taylor, 6-3, who guided Saint Anthony High School to the USA Today national high school championship. Quintrell Thomas is a bulky 6-7, 240-pounder from Newark, N.J.

The closest thing to a homegrown product in the class is guard Travis Releford, 6-5, from Kansas City, Mo., a two-time high school All-American.

It's a talented group, one that reminds some observers of the Chalmers-Rush-Julian Wright class of a few years ago. But they're also very young. Those same hopeful observers would be smart to remember how Chalmers, Rush and Arthur struggled in their first year.

"We're not as talented as we were last year," said Self. "We lost five guys to the draft and replaced them with young kids. But we are comparable to where we were three years ago when those guys that got drafted were all real young. So we could be looking at this team three years from now and say that is parallel to the team that finished up in 2008. I hope that's the case. We have good young players, there's no doubt about that."

Collins, who scored in double digits 15 times last year, including both games of the Final Four, is being counted on as a leader of this young but promising bunch. That in itself will be a big step up for the 5-11 Chicago native who incurred his coach's wrath when he came in overweight this year.

But if the Jayhawks are destined for another good year, Collins cannot be the only returnee who does well.

Cole Aldrich, a 6-11 sophomore, will need to continue the dazzling work he did in a breakthrough weekend at the Final Four. All season long, Aldrich had labored more or less anonymously, banging bodies in practice with the likes of Arthur and Jackson. Then against North Carolina's Tyler Hansbrough, the national player of the year, he had eight points, seven rebounds and four blocked shots in a shockingly lopsided 84-66 victory.

"I'm a junior. I'm the vet," said Collins. "A lot of things depend on me, Cole as well."

Most preseason polls pick the Jayhawks fourth or fifth in the Big 12, but Self is having none of it.

"We won't change what our goals are. Every year our goal is to win the league. At the end of the day, we want to play as close to our ceiling as possible," he said. "There's nothing wrong with setting the bar high."

So how high is this young team's ceiling?

"I don't know. Just because we are young doesn't mean we can't be good. How good I have no idea. We don't want to bail guys out of lofty expectations just because we are young."

(© 2009 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

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