Big XII rolling into conference play

<br>KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) _ It's quite a roll the Big 12 is on heading into the start of conference action this week, with every team above .500 and several riding impressive winning streaks. <br><br>Not

Monday, January 6th 2003, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) _ It's quite a roll the Big 12 is on heading into the start of conference action this week, with every team above .500 and several riding impressive winning streaks.

Not all teams are ranked as high as they were in the preseason poll. A few high-profile losses took care of that.

But Kansas coach Roy Williams has seen nothing to change what he was thinking when Big 12 teams first began practicing for the 2002-2003 season.

``I think it's the best league in the country,'' said Williams. ``And I think what we're seeing is that the people that are ranked 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th, 11th, 12th, whatever in the preseason have really shown that they're big-time basketball teams.''

Williams' No. 18 Jayhawks (9-3) open defense of their Big 12 title Monday night at Iowa State on a six-game winning streak but sobered by what could be the league's most damaging injury.

Sophomore forward Wayne Simien, their leading rebounder and second-leading scorer, dislocated his right shoulder Saturday in Kansas' 100-46 rout of a Missouri-Kansas City team that had no business even being on the same court with the Jayhawks.

If Simien is out for an extended period, repeating as Big 12 champs will become doubly hard for the Jayhawks, who seemed to have found their identity after faltering early following the departure of Drew Gooden, last year's leading scorer and rebounder in the Big 12.

After No. 7 Texas' 80-64 win over Mount St. Mary's, every Big 12 team was starting the week on a winning streak after helping the conference wrack up more than 100 wins against non-conference foes for the fifth straight season.

Yes, that includes the usual generous helping of such patsies as Missouri-Kansas City, North Carolina-Asheville and Arkansas-Pine Bluff. But also in the mix are wins over the likes of Michigan, Georgia and Michigan State.

Everybody but Kansas and Iowa State will launch their conference seasons this coming Saturday.

The Longhorns (8-2), the highest-ranked team in the conference at this point, had won three in a row before Sunday's game.

Iowa State and Oklahoma State are the first Big 12 teams to reach double-digit wins and stand 10-1. The Cyclones, with an influx of new players, have lost only to Boston College and won five in a row.

Oklahoma State, which got off to a 13-0 start last year, collected its 10th win by beating Brigham Young 78-65 Saturday night in Oklahoma City's new Ford Center. The Cowboys will host Texas A&M-Corpus Christi on Wednesday in their next game, then begin conference action on Saturday against No. 16 Missouri (8-1), which won beat Iowa 88-82 on Saturday.

Oklahoma State's 8-game winning streak is the longest in the Big 12 and all but two of the Cowboys' wins have been by double digits.

``I've been here three years,'' said guard Melvin Sanders. ``I think this is the best team I've been on since I've been here. We play a lot harder, we execute better and our defense is a lot better.''

No. 10 Oklahoma (8-2) got a quality win at the Ford Center on Saturday night, beating No. 14 Michigan State 60-58. Next up on Tuesday night is a home game against No. 5 Connecticut before conference play begins Saturday against Colorado (9-3).

The Sooners had an especially tough pre-conference schedule, with games against No. 1 Alabama and No. 8 Mississippi State as well as Michigan State and Connecticut.

``That's one of those schedules where you don't sit there and think you're going to win all four of them,'' said coach Kelvin Sampson.

A victory against Connecticut would make Oklahoma .500 against those four.

``If we can go 2-2 with that bunch, there's nothing wrong with that,'' Sampson said.