Kansas City, Mo. — Kansas men’s basketball coach Bill Self was at the University of Kansas hospital instead of T-Mobile Center for the top-seeded Jayhawks’ 78-61 win over West Virginia on Thursday, and the KU leader will miss the rest of the Big 12 tournament.
Self was admitted to the hospital late Wednesday night to recover from an illness and was said to be “doing well and receiving great care.”
After Thursday’s game, KU updated Self’s status
“KU men’s basketball coach Bill Self is a patient at The University of Kansas Health System,” the Thursday evening statement confirmed. “Chief Medical Officer Dr. Steve Stites wants to clarify that coach Self did not suffer a heart attack as reported by some media. He arrived at the emergency department last night and underwent a standard procedure that went well. He is expected to make a full recovery. There will be no further medical details released for now.”
The KU players were told about Self’s situation early Thursday morning. Acting head coach Norm Roberts, who also ran the team when Self was suspended in November, said it was important to update the players Thursday morning instead of making them deal with and think about the situation throughout the night Wednesday.
Although he and the rest of the KU staff were concerned for their longtime friend, Roberts said everyone remained calm.
“We were reassured that he was going to be OK and that stuff,” Roberts said after the game. “There was never a moment where we thought he wasn’t going to be OK.”
Roberts and Self spoke on the phone briefly after Thursday’s win, and Self, who watched the game on television, offered his own statement after the game went final.
“I am very grateful for the overwhelming number of well wishes my family and I have received,” he said. “I’m excited to get back with my team in the very near future.”
A source with knowledge of Self’s condition told the Journal-World that the long-term prognosis was positive.
Although the health component was unique, Roberts stepping in for Self was not totally unfamiliar for the Jayhawks.
Previously the head coach at St. John’s from 2004-10 and also at his alma mater, Queens College, from 1991-95, Roberts led Kansas to three wins in three tries earlier this season, including a Champions Classic victory over Duke in Indianapolis.
Self was with the Jayhawks at the team’s open practice at T-Mobile Center on Wednesday afternoon and he met with the media for about 15 minutes after the practice session ended.
He seemed to be in normal condition and was in good spirits about the start of the postseason and KU’s readiness to make another run at a national title later this month.
“We’ve talked a lot about it,” Self said Wednesday on the start of the Jayhawks’ postseason run. “We’ve talked about we’re going to Kansas City to try to put ourselves in position to win this thing, but knowing we better take one game at a time. But I haven’t put emphasis of to win it. I’ve put the emphasis on let’s go play our best. What the (Big 12) tournament does, it can validate what your regular season’s been. And this is an opportunity to validate it.”
The Jayhawks (25-6) won the Big 12 regular season title by one game over Texas and entered this week as the top seed in Kansas City, in good position to be a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament next week.
All of that, however, likely has taken a back burner to the health of the Jayhawks’ head coach.
Self is 581-130 during his 20 seasons in charge of the Jayhawks and 788-235 in his 30 seasons as a head coach, which included stops at Oral Roberts, Tulsa and Illinois before Kansas.
He has long been regarded as one of the top coaches in the game, with one of the best winning percentages in NCAA basketball history, and has been thought of more recently as the best active coach in basketball with the recent retirements of Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski, North Carolina’s Roy Williams and Villanova’s Jay Wright.
Kansas football coach Lance Leipold, during a press conference following Day 6 of his team’s 15 spring football practices, had this to say about the Self situation.
“It sounds like he’s in good care and those things and I wish him the best,” Leipold said. “It’s unfortunate that it happens at this time for his team.”
