Notes From the Big 12 Tournament

News and notes from the Sprint Center, following KU's win over Texas to capture the Big 12 Tournament trophy.

Texas has now lost six straight conference tournament finals. They are now 0-5 in Big 12 championship games and also lost their final Southwest Conference final in 1995. No Texas school has ever won a Big 12 tournament title.

Texas lost for just the second time in 22 games when leading at the half.

Both Mario Chalmers and Brandon Rush broke Kenton Paulino and JamesOn Curry's shared record of five three-point shots in a Big 12 tournament final. Chalmers hit on 8-of-12 and Rush made 6-of-9.

With 30 points, Chalmers nearly tied Wayne Simien's KU record of 31 points in a Big 12 tournament game (against Missouri in 2004).

A day after scoring 28 points on 9-of-13 shooting (5-of-8 from behind the arc), Brandon Rush scored 19 on 6-of-12 shooting (6-of-9 from 19-9). In the last two games, Rush averaged 23.5 points while shooting 60 percent from the floor, including 11-of-17 from three (64.7 percent).

Rush finished the tournament with 13 three-point field goals – second most for an individual in a single tournament. Oklahoma's Gideon Alexander made 16 in 1999. In his previous seven tournament games, Rush had averaged just 11.3 points and shot just 35.5 percent from the field.

Kansas has now won six Big 12 tournaments. The rest of the conference has combined to win six.

The Jayhawks recorded 25 assists on 26 field goals Sunday.

The 91 combined points scored in the first half of the KU-Texas game broke the tournament record for points scored in a half of a championship game. Last March, KU and Texas combined for 85 (Kansas 45, Texas 40). It also marked the highest scoring half in a tournament game since Baylor and Missouri scored 97 in a first-round game last year.

The Longhorns and Jayhawks combined to hit on 27-of-53 three-pointers, destroying the old records for combined threes in a tournament final. In the '06 final, KU and Texas combined for 20-of-45 on shots from behind the arc.

KU connected on 15 threes Sunday to break the old record for three-point shots made in a tournament final. By making 12, Texas tied the old mark.

With those 15 three-balls, KU also broke the record for three-point shots in a Big 12 tournament game. The old record was 14, shared by Missouri (vs. Texas A&M, 2001) and Colorado (vs. Texas, 1999).
 
By winning its third consecutive Big 12 tournament, KU joins Belmont (Atlantic Sun Conference), Winthrop (Big South), Memphis (Conference USA), Davidson (Southern) and Oral Roberts (Mid-Continent/Summit) as teams who have won their conference's automatic NCAA tournament bid in each of the last three years.