By Todd Leabo

Being a fan of any team can be frustrating. You hang on every possession, every whistle, every free throw or bounce pass.  Sometimes it seems like you might actually care more than the players on your favorite team.  Going undefeated is out of the question and even losing just a few is rare in college basketball so fans are left to shake their heads about chances lost.

Missouri fans have only had to deal with losses three times so far this year, but they are to teams currently in 5^th (K-State twice) and 7^th (Oklahoma State) in the Big 12 standings.  They’ve yet to lose to Kansas or Baylor who’ve been ranked in the Top 10 in the country for most of the season, so they’ve had their share of frustration.

Being a fan of Kansas State would be even more maddening.  How can you easily beat the #3 team in the country twice (Missouri) and get swept by a dreadful Oklahoma squad.  How bad are the Sooners?  They actually lost by 18 points to Texas Tech.  Yes, that same Texas Tech team that has lost their other 13 Big 12 games by an average of 18 points per game… but I digress… you see how maddening it can be?  I went to Oklahoma and I’d like to think if my alma mater can find a way to beat K-State twice they might be able to win a couple more Big 12 games too.

Back to the frustration that matters.  K-State looked like a team that was in trouble a week ago.  Their RPI had slipped to around 60.  Now they’ve beaten Baylor and Missouri for consecutive road wins over Top 10 games.

Their RPI has climbed back into the 40s and they’ve got three regular-season games left… home against ISU on the road against Texas A&M and home against OSU.  You would think they could win those games.  Of course, you would think K-State wouldn’t lose to the lowly Sooners twice either so there’s still work to do for the ‘Cats.

I’m sure these next few weeks will hold some frustration for K-Staters and nearly every other of the 300+ Division I teams in the country except for the one that finds their way through the field to win it all in New Orleans.