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With BYU’s road win, the Big 12’s big dogs remain easy top 10 voter fodder

Big 12 has a strong case for being the best conference in the country

Published: Jan 11, 2026, 7:06 p.m. MST

BYU Cougars guard Richie Saunders (15) is fouled by Utah Utes forward Seydou Traore (0) as Utah and BYU play at the Huntsman Center in in Salt Lake City, on Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026. Scott G Winterton, Deseret News

Dick Harmon is a sports columnist for the Deseret News in his fourth decade reporting on college athletics.

The Big 12 continues to be the NCAA’s most dominant basketball conference.

With No. 9 BYU’s 89-84 win over Utah, the Big 12’s four Top 25 teams remained undefeated in conference play Saturday with No. 1 Arizona and No. 3 Iowa State leading the way as undefeated and perfect at 16-0 overall and No. 7 Houston and BYU at 15-1.

All four are 3-0 in league play.

Richie Saunders backed up his career scoring night of 31 in the Marriott Center last Wednesday with the best rebounding game (14) of his Cougar career Saturday and led BYU with 24 points.

With Rob Wright III adding 23 points and AJ Dybantsa’s 20, Kevin Young’s Big Three combined for 67 of the Cougars’ 89 points.

In three Big 12 games, Saunders and Wright have each scored a total of 68 points (22.6 average), while Dybantsa, facing double and triple team defensive ploys, has 67 (22.3 ppg).

Combined, these three Cougars have 203 points in league play and 1,091 this season through 16 games.

Utah’s Terrance Brown scored 25 points in a losing effort for the Utes, but that total was the most points scored by a Big 12 player on Saturday.

According to ESPN, Dybantsa is the first Division I freshman in the last 30 seasons to have nine straight games of 20-plus points on 50% field-goal shooting.

Via ESPN Research: AJ Dybantsa is the first Division-I freshman in the last 30 seasons to have nine straight games of 20-plus points on 50% field-goal shooting.pic.twitter.com/oosmPmJiW1
— Jeff Borzello (@jeffborzello) January 11, 2026

It was Dybantsa’s ninth straight game of 20-plus points, the most in a row for a Big 12 freshman since Trae Young (Oklahoma).

Dybantsa’s 11 games this season with 20+ points are tied with Shawn Bradley for second among BYU freshmen, behind Danny Ainge with 18.

Why did the No. 9 Cougars struggle to put away the so-so Utes?

Analysis: Utah’s fight was there against No. 9 BYU, but the little details cost Utes a shot at the upset

With Utah focusing its defense on Dybantsa, the Cougars won because of Saunders’ consistent scoring and elite rebounding, and Wright simply took over the game off the dribble with the shot clock running down.

Of Saunders, BYU coach Kevin Young declared, “He’s a possessed man, in a good way. He just wasn’t gonna lose, bottom line.”

With Wisconsin beating previously undefeated Michigan 91-88 on Saturday, BYU got a big boost in opponent ratings because the Cougars defeated Wisconsin on a neutral court back in November by 28 points.

Now Wisconsin is a Quad 1 win for BYU, which is 5-1 against Quad 1 opponents.

On Sunday, BYU was No. 11 in KenPom’s ratings. In the NCAA’s NET rankings, Arizona is No. 2, Iowa State No. 3 and BYU No. 9 with Utah moving up 10 spots to make BYU’s win a Quad 2 win.

Houston was No. 12.

Any way you cut it, the Big 12 is a formidable basketball league, and BYU’s need to hold on at Utah in the final minutes and Kansas’ loss at UCF 86-75 on Saturday show how tough it is, especially on the road.

Kansas is 11-5 and 2-1 in Big 12 play, and Self’s projected No. 1 draft pick Darryn Peterson played 31 minutes and scored 23 points after an injury had limited him to just seven games played this season.

Self said if a couple of his players want to take plays off and give up a couple of 3-pointers, his Jims were better than your Joes and so what.

“You’ve got to play harder than that,” he said. “That’s just college basketball. Everybody’s going through that. Some teams having gone through it but make no mistake about what I’m saying.

“No excuse, but the margin for error isn’t one that we can let teams believe they can beat you and we give other teams that confidence, and the next thing you know they’re playing well at home and they get cooking.”

How social media reacted to No. 9 BYU’s win over rival Utah

For the Utes, the packed Huntsman Center proved an extra boost for coach Alex Jensen, a feature he’d like to enjoy for his players.

“It was fun to play for a full arena. Reminded me (of) years ago. They played really hard. Can’t fault the effort, but just the little details cost us,” Jensen said.

“That’s the way that place has been for decades. There’s nothing like it. It’s hard for me, we play (No. 1) Arizona and it’s half full... We know that winning is everything, and we’re making progress on that.”

On Saturday Arizona defeated TCU 86-73, Iowa State beat Oklahoma State 83-71, Houston handled Baylor 77-55, Texas Tech nipped Colorado 73-71 and Arizona State defeated Kansas State 87-84.

On Tuesday, West Virginia plays at Houston, Iowa State is at Kansas and Baylor travels to Oklahoma State.

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On Wednesday, Colorado is at Cincinnati, UCF travels to Kansas State, Utah will go to Lubbock and take on Texas Tech, while ASU is at Arizona and TCU goes to Provo to play the Cougars.

Is there danger ahead?

Bill Self is right.

This is a league that is capable of cannibalizing itself.