Sport-Blog.com

It is very easy today, especially in our politically correct world, to upset people. But a recent gaffe in the Big 12 Conference has led to all kinds of speculation, rumors as to how it might have happened, including suggestions of league favoritism.

The basics of the situation are simple. On Sunday afternoon, after Texas beat Oklahoma 72-48, the Longhorns were handed a prestigious-looking trophy that was hoisted during the traditional mid-court celebration. Unfortunately, the Sunday win simply meant that Texas tied the Kansas Jayhawks for the Big 12 crown.

However, the day before, when Kansas beat Kansas State 66-52 to clinch at least a tie depending on what Texas did Sunday, no such trophy was presented. In fact, no one from the Big 12 office was even on hand to congratulate the Jayhawks.

The snub led to major speculation. After all, the conference is headquartered in Dallas, the very heart of Texas. In addition, those officials reportedly all live in the Dallas area. Therefore the charge came immediately that the Big 12 was portraying a Texas bias.

With those two schools involved in fierce recruiting battles for the top athletic prospects the issue turned to the PR piece. The co-champions from Austin were splashed all over the media, in newspapers and on television, proudly displaying that Big 12 championship trophy. The co-champions from Lawrence not only failed to get the same level of publicity, the school did not even receive a handshake from any one from the conference office.

Kansas coach Bill Self as well as many Jayhawks fans were incensed by the omission and the subsequent publicity that Texas received. A call to the conference headquarters brought an acknowledgment that a mistake had been made. Said that office, we should not recognize teams
until after a championship has been clinched and therefore the trophy should not have gone to Texas to be awarded.

However, true to form in today's world, one Big 12 official immediately blamed the problem on the trophy company in Oklahoma City. That seemed to clash with the fact that Big 12 officials were on hand to present the trophy in Texas.

Ironically, there could be no certainty heading into the final regular-season weekend as to who would win the conference title. In fact, had Kansas State beaten Kansas and Oklahoma then beaten Texas, then the Jayhawks, Sooners and Longhorns all would have tied for the title.

So the fact that people were there to present the award to Texas has to represent one of the bigger mistakes to be made in athletics in recent years. Certainly it was the type of mistake that a big time athletic conference should never have made.

Conference officials had to be enormously embarrassed by their Big Gaffe.