“It’s unbelievable,” Fraschilla said, just as the 3-pointer dropped through the bottom of the net. “Bill Self said this, it’s nothing new, he may be the most underrated player in college basketball. You would never know that he may be the most important player on the No. 3 team in the country if he was walking down Massachusetts Street.”

This isn’t the first time Fraschilla has called Harris the most underrated player in the country, he’s not the only one who has made this statement either. Like he said, it is nothing new. But it begs the question, can you be underrated if everybody is calling you the most underrated player in the country?

Of course, the answer is entirely based on perception. Kansas fans would surely recognize their national champion point guard if he was walking down the street in downtown Lawrence. Texas Tech fans certainly won’t forget about Harris when these two teams meet again after Tuesday’s performance.

Harris, a redshirt junior who has played 84 games and started 55 of them at the collegiate level, scored a career-high 18 points to lead the Jayhawks (13-1, 2-0 Big 12) to their first conference road win of the year. His previous highest scoring output was 14 points, a feat he has accomplished four times.

While normally a facilitator, Harris finished with a career-best five 3-pointers on the same number of attempts.

The shooting prowess was necessary to have success against Mark Adams’ no-middle defense. With interior baskets hard to come by, KU’s plan of attack was to overload one side and set up a shooter with cross-court skip passes. The Jayhawks went 11-for-24 from long range, which marked their most 3-pointers made on the road since Jan. 27, 2020 against Oklahoma State.

Harris being responsible for five of them certainly helped, with each triple coming at pivotal moments of the game. Harris has only attempted five 3-pointers in a game three other times in his career.

If Harris was a bit underrated on a national level before, he certainly won’t be after Tuesday’s performance.

Evan Miya’s analytical website is able to quantify a player’s impact on both ends of the floor with his Bayesian Performance Rating. Harris has a BPR of 4.48 to rank 40th in the country and he’s third in the conference in the metric, trailing only Markquis Nowell (5.24) of Kansas State and Jalen Wilson (5.18) of Kansas in the league.

On Tuesday’s “After Dark” show on the Field of 68 (skip to the 30-minute mark), Rob Dauster started a conversation about how many point guards would rank ahead of Harris in the country. Dauster, the founder of the Field of 68, settled on six for his answer.

“I don’t know if he’s the guy you want taking 20 shots a game, being the star of your team,” Dauster explained on the show. “But if there are pieces around you, I don’t know if there is someone that is better at facilitating, kind of running the show, playing defense, being a ball hawk. He does all the stuff you want him to do, and it is why they won a title last year.”

And that’s the whole argument, right? While Harris might not be underrated on a national level anymore, there are still elements to his game that continue to fly under the radar.

Kansas faced a quick 13-5 hole against Texas Tech (10-4, 0-2 Big 12), which had won 29 consecutive games at United Supermarkets Arena prior to Tuesday. The fans were going crazy, and former Red Raider Kevin McCullar Jr. was dealing with foul trouble.

But the Jayhawks were able to weather the initial storm because of Harris. He connected on a pair of 3-pointers, recording eight points and one assist to make it a one-possession game by the second media timeout.

When KU’s double-digit lead evaporated in the closing minutes, the visiting team never wavered and made the key plays to close it out. The Jayhawks have now won 24 of their last 25 games, dating back to a 11-game win streak to end last season.

“My guys have played in a lot of big games and key players have played in big games,” Self said. “When you got a point guard that can handle a game as well as we have, you know, that gives everybody confidence.”