Texas Basketball: 3 gifts Shaka Smart would really want for Christmas

3) Christmas gifts for Texas basketball HC Shaka Smart

A Big 12 regular season and/or tournament title

Head coach Bill Self and the Jayhawks are the routine Big 12 regular season title holders over the course of the last 15 years or so. It’s rare to see another Big 12 team on the hardwood take the mantle in the regular season from Kansas, but maybe this can be the year that the Longhorns get it done.

The last time that the Longhorns won a Big 12 regular season title was back during the 2007-08 campaign, just after the time when Kevin Durant was starring on the Forty Acres. And the last conference tournament title for the Longhorns came way back during the 1994-95 season, when Texas played in the Southwest Conference.

Starting off the conference slate with a solid win at home over superstar freshman point guard Cade Cunningham and a young and talented Oklahoma State team is great for Smart’s Longhorns. If Texas can take care of business against the Jayhawks after the turn of the calendar year, it would go a long way to building momentum toward the top of the Big 12 standings.

It is a shame that the Longhorns had their originally scheduled Big 12 opener delayed, which was supposed to take place on Dec. 13 on the road at the Ferrell Center against the No. 2 ranked Baylor Bears.

Texas will have a really difficult challenge ahead with their Big 12 Title aspirations in holding off the likes of Baylor, Kansas, West Virginia, etc. But they do have the talent and depth to do so under Smart’s direction in this potentially special and memorable season.