Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - BARNETT BOMBS: Why Kansas Freshman Luke Barnett Might TRANSFORM Jayhawks' 3-Point Prowess

Episode Date: July 14, 2026

Kansas Jayhawks fans eye incoming freshman Luke Barnett as a potential game-changer—could his elite three-point shooting earn him a spot in Bill Self’s rotation? Analyst Derek Johnson spotlights Barnett’s sharpshooting prowess, off-ball intelligence, and defensive questions, exploring how his fit alongside top talent like Tyron Stokes might shape KU’s offensive strategy this season. Key topics include Barnett’s statistical dominance at Mater Dei, the battle for KU’s best shooter title with Leroy Blyden, and what Barnett must prove to crack the rotation. The episode also covers major Jayhawks news: LaGerald Vick’s legal trouble, Ted Owens’ Hall of Fame honor, and key KU baseball returns with Augusto Mungarietta and Cade Baldridge. Can the Jayhawks harness their revamped roster for a Big 12 breakthrough, and what’s at stake for Barnett and Kansas as tipoff nears? Everydayer ClubIf you never miss an episode, it’s time to make it official. Join the Locked On Everydayer Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord, and more — all built for our most loyal fans. Click here to learn more and join your team’s community: https://lockedonpodcasts.com/everydayerclub   Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!   Indeed Listeners of this show get a $75 Sponsored Job Credit to help give your job the premium placement it deserves at http://Indeed.com/podcast FanDuel Today's episode is brought to you by FanDuel. From the opening whistle to the final kick, Let There Be Goals on FanDuel. Visit https://FANDUEL.COM to get started now.   FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

I think incoming freshman Luke Barnett has a real chance to see the floor in year one. And a big reason why he can shoot it really, really well. You are Locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks, part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. What's up, Derek Johnson here? This is Locked on Jayhawks. Thanks for making it your first listen every day. And on today's episode of the show, we're going to be breaking down some of the latest news,

a lot to get to between some more players. sue in the NCAA for another year. Ted Owen, some cool news. Some more KU baseball players announcing will also get into right now, Luke Barnett, what his potential ceiling and floor could be for KU, his potential role, and what he could bring to the table in year one on this player preview, this time moving on to Luke Barnett. So Barnett is an incoming freshman in the class for KU, listed on the KU roster at 6'4-170 pounds. He is from Southern California, out of modern day high school where he was a four-star recruit at 24-7 sports and on the 24-7 composite, actually ranked 123 in the country on the 247 composite.

And you look at the stats from last season for Barnett. You're talking about, you know, one of the elite shooters in high school basketball, 19.2 points per game, 4.8 rebounds, 2.2 assists. He had a 2-1 assist to turnover ratio, and he also averaged 2.8. stocks per game. Modern A does play in one of the more competitive high school leagues in the country, and he was successful throughout his high school career. You're talking about somebody who had over 40 or over 2,200 points over the course of his varsity high school career. He made 4133 pointers over his four years of high school basketball. This dude is a sharpshooter

to the, you know, highest degree. I think there's a real chance he is KU's best shooter. on the team. Now, it might be Leroy Blyden, but I think the competition to me is between Blyden and Barnett. This was in the little blurb on 24-7 sports on Barnett's scouting report from Adam Finkelstein of 247. And this was from his player evaluation in the summer of 25. He said he took over 70% of his shots from behind the arc in EYBL play, and he made 37% of his total threes. So very good percentage during, you know, that tournament competition in aAU ball. He knocked down a whopping 47% of his unguarded catch and shoot three point attempts. He's also an extremely efficient finisher, 71% at the rim in EYBL, who finds easy points by

sprinting the floor in transition and seizing opportunities to decisively attack bad closeouts. So basically what you're talking about there is this dude is as elite of a, you know, catch and shoot shooter as there is in the class. And he's also smart enough to understand that, hey, if somebody, you know, puts too much attention on me from three or somebody, uh, you know, tries to close out and over emphasizes the three point shot, I'm just going to drive right by him and I'm going to get an easy bucket. Or if somebody's, you know, face guarding me, I'm going to back cut them and get an easy

bucket to the rim. I'm going to know when I need to leak out and get ahead of the defense and try to get an easy two for us in transition. smart player who uses his three point shooting to his benefit, not just in terms of the actual shot from three, but to lead to some other areas of scoring and efficiency for him and his team. Now, when you look at the three biggest strengths here, I mean, we have to start there.

It's the shooting, right? Because you're talking about a high percentage of made threes. Again, 47% of his unguarded catch and shoot three point attempts at the EYBL. Shoots a very high percentage. Would not shock me if he comes into KU. year and he is a, you know, 40% three-point shooter this season. But it's also a ton of volume. Like I said, he made 413 three-pointers over the course of his four-year high school career,

you know? Unfortunately, his high school stats don't list the number of field goal attempts, but let's say he's shooting 40% from three over the course of his high school career, which, you know, I don't know, it could be 38. It could be 42. I have no idea. But let's say he was shooting 40%. That basically means he was taking like 1,000, three-point shots over the course of his

four years of high school, which if then you divvy out to say, say four years. That's like 253 point attempts per season in high school. And they're probably playing, what, 30 games, 25, 30 games over there. So he's taking like 9, 10, 3s at a high school level per game. So yes, he's shooting them at a very high volume, which tells you that he has the ability to get them off in a lot of different ways. And the ability to get them off even when he's, you know,

being guarded heavily by opposing teams and, you know, really underlined by opponent scouting reports. he can do it off the dribble. You go watch some of his tape. He can do it off the dribble. He can do it off the catch. I do think from KU's perspective, his most lethal

three point ability will be when he does it off the catch because I think when you look at it like KU for the most part, he won't be out there as the lead point guard for KU. He'll be out there as an off ball three point sniper, but he can clearly do that. And the shot release is super quick. Like go watch video of this dude. the shot looks super pure.

It looks super quick. It looks, the importance of that is it's translatable, right? As you go up against better athletes, faster players who are going to close out on you a little bit stronger, can you still get your shots off? And that's something he doesn't have to worry about. It also allows him to get the shots off in a quicker period of time where he can get them off. If he's slightly contested, as opposed to somebody else who's a longer shot, they might have to be more wide open to take it. He doesn't have to worry about that. And he can even take it to, you know, another gear.

He can take it to sixth gear if he wants to in terms of the shot. There are highlights of him shooting no dip threes, which if you don't know what a no dip three is, it's basically you catch it. And let's say you catch it like head high. You just immediately are going up with the shot basically as you were catching it almost. Like the ball never comes down from where you catch it. You just catch it and it goes up, right? He has the ability to do that and he makes them.

And that just again. adds to the idea that like you can't give this guy any space if you give him any space he's going to have enough time to get off the three and he's a really good shooter that he's going to make you pay for it right and that can be exciting because you think of k you maybe not having enough three point shooting in some of the recent years if you pair this with the right mix of players he could be a really dangerous weapon now the question is is that a dangerous weapon in year three at Kansas and can you get them to stay that long, right, with the way the transfer portal is, or is that somebody who can make an impact right away in year one here at KU?

The next biggest strength, though, is the off ball officiado, right? He's a low usage player. He's not somebody who is going to lead to a lot of turnovers, again, a two to one assist to turnover ratio. He can still be a bit of a secondary ball handler while being an off ball player, and you have to have some of those players. If you have five players on the court who are all on ball players, there's only one basketball, right?

Other players are going to have to figure out how to make an impact. He knows how to make an impact without the ball. Like I said, whether it's spotting up from three, whether it's cutting, whether it's working out in transition, he knows how to still make. And for a lot of guys coming from the high school ranks where maybe they were the star of their high school basketball team, they always had the ball in their hand. So they didn't, like, it's an adjustment for them to have to come into college and have to play off the ball.

That's not going to be the case here for Luke Barnett. And then the last strength here is I do think getting steals quick hands. I think he's going to be a smart defender. I think he's a smart basketball player. And again, he was averaging 2.8 stocks per game. He was averaging half a block and 2.3 steals per game. That's where he come up with that number in high school. Now, get it.

High school is not the same as college in terms of getting those steals. But the fact he was averaging 2.3 per game tells me that he should be able to translate at least a little bit to the collegiate level, that he should be at least a decent player at getting steals for you. And as we move on to the two biggest questions, the first biggest question here is the defense. If he's at least getting steals that can at least, you know, raise the floor of what his defense can kind of be. And one of the big reasons that one of the questions is defense, it's the athleticism questions, right? Is he fast enough? Is he quick enough? Does he have a big enough vertical? Is he strong enough?

You know, is he lengthy enough? Like those are real questions that are going to kind of come into this. And then on the defensive end of the floor, how do those things get exposed? is he going to have trouble keeping guys in front of him? Is he going to be somebody who's just constantly targeted by the other team when he is out there on the floor? Those would be big questions, right? I don't even know if he has to be a neutral defender. If he can just be like a below average defender where it's still kind of a net negative,

but it's at least within range of allowing his offense to carry the day, I think that's going to be enough for him in year one here for Kansas. But that is a real question of like you can make the argument. He's the best three-point shooter on the team. You could maybe also make the argument that like he has the most questions of defense of any player on the team right now, right? And it doesn't mean it will work out for him. It's just a question right now as he moves up to the collegiate level. The second biggest question here is what else is he going to bring to the table besides scoring now or besides shooting?

Now, maybe you don't need him to, right? If he's just asked to be a role player, you just want him to play that role and do that one thing, especially in year one. But again, can he find a way to still grab a couple of rebounds here or there, still be an extra ball handler and not be bothered by good athletes, at least be, you know, enough on the defensive end of the floor. Can you find other ways to get you on the court diving for loose balls that endears you to Bill's self to allow you for the, you know, long leash from three point range, so to speak. And one final thought here for Luke Barnett, I think there is that real case that he is the best three point shooter on the team. Now, from a functional standpoint of who's actually out there, I think it'll be Leroyd-Bleiden.

I do think there's going to be a real chance that Luke Barnett is that guy, though, but is he going to play enough to kind of make that work? It's interesting because, you know, if you go to past seasons for KU, how many times could you point to, hey, that guy's the best three-point shooter on the team, and he's not part of the rotation? I don't know. Like, maybe you could point to some of that, you know? It seems like Bill Self, like, if you're the best defender on the team versus if you're

the best three-point shooter on the team. I feel like Bill Self is going to play the best defender on the team over the best three-point shooter on the team necessarily. So it's not a guarantee that you're going to be in the rotation, but it certainly would help in that perspective. And even if he's number two, you know, behind Blyden, it's still a pertinent conversation and one that I think will have a big effect on where his role is with the team, specifically in year one, because I do think it would be a really fun fit playing next to Tyron Stokes. But let's get more into that fit as well as potential floor and ceiling next. This is Locked on Jayhawks.

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Just go to Indeed.com slash podcast. Just go to Indeed.com slash podcast. Unlocked on Jayhawks. That is Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply need to hire. This is a job for Indeed sponsor jobs. Thanks, you for joining us here on Locked on Jayhawks. Luke Barnett comes in as a true freshman. And though he's not ranked as high as Davy on Adkins or Taylin Kinney, you know, I still think there's a chance that this dude could wind up in the rotation for KU. Now that said, if we're talking ceiling versus floor here,

I think the floor outcome is that, yeah, he's not really playing much for KU this season, right? I think it would come from the lack of athleticism where, you know, he can't, like the only thing he can bring to the offense is his three-point shooting. but what if as a true freshman, you know, there are adjustments he has to make against bigger, stronger competition where he's closer to a 35% three-point shooter, where now the deficiencies may be in some of those other areas that you have questions about become more prominent versus if you're a 40% three-point shooter, like I said, if you're below average defender but you're shooting 40% from three,

you can stay on the floor, especially depending on the personnel around you. But if you're a bad defender and shooting 35% from three, it's tougher to keep you on floor. So there are like certain levels here. And I think that's what it would kind of look at, that he struggles to stay in front of anybody, that he's getting targeted all the time on the defensive end of the floor, that maybe the three point shot is good, but it's not great just yet. And I think in that scenario, he would end up outside of the rotation. It's tough because he can do a lot of things well, and he still might max out at being KU's ninth man this year. And that's just kind of the, based on the additions KU has had, in addition to the returning players. If you're looking at

the ceiling outcome here for Kansas, I do think it's, going back to the idea, he's one of the best three-point shooters on the team. He's one of the best freshman shooters in the country. He shoots over 40% from three on good volume when he's in there, and he can at least hold up in the other ends of the game. He gives you another potential, you know, secondary ball handler, right? And he does wind up being a rotation player for KU. The question here with the ceiling outcome would be like he could shoot 40% from three.

If Dennis Parker and Cole Rosario are both shooting well from. three, he could still be a good three-point shooter, but he's not going to be in the rotation. Is the outcome for him being in the rotation not only shooting that well from three, but also one of Rosario or Parker struggling? Maybe, maybe. It's either that or it's KU playing a nine-man rotation. That's kind of the way I see it, right? Now, that said, if I am predicting the role right now, I do think for me, it's like the 10th man. I have Adkins right now as the ninth man, and then I have Barnett as the 10th man, which if you're that ninth, 10th man, you're both, especially since they're different positions, right, you're both kind of in that range of

being players that one specific night, you're not going to play. Another night, it might play four minutes. You know, Luke Marnett might come into a game, misses his first three, makes a mistake on defense, he's done for the rest of the night, you know? But then there's going to be another night in there where Luke Barnett, you know, comes in, holds up enough on defense, makes his first two threes, and Bill's office like, hey, you're playing 20 minutes today. We really like your floor spacing, you know,

and he ends up being in three or four threes in that specific game, right? It's just kind of spot minutes. It depends game to game. It depends on your performance. It depends on the matchup. It depends on how you are impacting the rest of the floor for the other players. Are you making life easier on Tyrant Sox? And that is where I do think it is going to be helpful for a player like Luke Barnett.

Okay, think about it. Tyrant Stokes, even though he's a win. is a player that is going to dominate the basketball, right? He's going to be another ball handler for KU. So you basically end up in a situation. Like if you look at some of the teams of the NBA, for instance, who have these ball dominant kind of wings, like a Jason Tatum, a Luca Donchich,

who in a way are almost like point guards, but they're really wings who are just handling the ball as point guards on offense. Those teams basically have point guards who are three-point shooters that can play off ball, play off of them. And so a player like Barnett becomes actually a really good fit next to Stokes because it gives you another guard on the floor who can play off of him, but also give you the ball handling if you need him to have the ball. And the other part of it is the actions you can run with it where, you know, like you can run actions where you have Luke Barnett in the corner and you run a pick and roll with Stokes and whoever else.

and if they put the extra defense to try to stop Stokes from driving in, he just kicks it out to Barnett and knocks down a three. And that's going to be tough to do. You could even run a pick and roll where you have Barnett is the lead guard, and Stokes is setting a screen for him. If you go under the screen to try to deal with Stokes, Barnett can pop the three. If you, you know, chase the, if you, I don't know, hard hedge it,

or if you chase around it, then you get the ball to Stokes. And now he's in kind of a short roll situation, which would be a good situation. to have for Tyron Soakes in the KU offense. So I do think there's some really interesting things you can do offensively with him. I do think if you're going to put him in the game, you're probably going to need some more defensive insulation out there. So maybe when Barnett goes in the game is when like Trent Perry comes into the game or maybe

when Barnett goes into the game is when you play two big basketball, right? Like let's say you're playing Davyana Adkins at the four and Paul and Beaumia at the five. Maybe that's a perfect situation for Barnett to come in because you're going to have less spacing on the floor so you need a better spacer and the defensive questions get made up for a little bit more because you have the athleticism and shot blocking of Adkins next to him via. So there's certain things that I think are qualifiers here that will affect the role. I do think he'll be a spot minute guy for KU. But like I said, if one of those guys of Rosario or I guess even Taylin Kinney or Parker ends up struggling more than we expect them to, maybe he could sneak his way into rotation.

And I do think he'll at least be useful as somebody you can throw in different situations throughout the year and try to get a three for you. All right. Let's finish up with some of the latest news. A lot to get to here, including some cool news about Ted Owens and good news for KU baseball with some more returning players. This is locked on Jayhawks. What's up there, Derek Johnson here? This is locked on Jayhawks. And some of the latest news, there's a lot to get to here. I'm just going to get this one out of the way quickly because it's not good news. Gerald Vick, former Jayhawk was charged with attempted murder. So we'll wait and see what happens with all of that one.

Obviously very bad news there. LaGerald had a lot of not so great things during his time at KU. None of them were nearly that, though, and it is unfortunate to hear about anybody. So that's quite the run of trouble that KU has had of late. But we'll wait to hear more on that one. Meanwhile, in much different, I guess happier light of the court side of things, more athletes are filing for another year for college basketball. We saw it basically at the injunction in Ohio.

Now there's like 11 kids trying to get it passed in Colorado. There's some others trying to get it going in Georgia. The more this becomes like a big thing, the more that it continues to avalanche, the more you feel good about getting Malik U.N. In tow for KU. We just did an episode on that yesterday. So thank you if you already caught that. And you're in every day.

Or if not, go back and check it out and hear a conversation talking Malikian in that Ohio case and how it could be good news for KU to get another year there. Meanwhile, tip times as well have been announced for the Players Era tournament. Kansas knows they're playing UNLV. They're in the Players Era 8, which is the week before Thanksgiving. They know that first game against UNOV. They'll be playing at 8.30 central time. So I believe that'll be the nightcap there for that one.

If they win that game, which they'll be expected to, so as long as they can take care of business, they would play in their next game at 630, which would be potentially against either Auburn or West Virginia. So we know the tip times for that. and you can find the full bracket on line. I may mention that Ted Owens, former KU basketball coach and just a super nice guy. He's incredible. He's got to be close to 100 at this point.

He's at least in his 90s right now. And he's still like there. Like he's still like driving himself around. I think he's still like once a year drives himself up from, because I think he lives in Oklahoma, like up to a KU game and goes. Really cool what he has done. So he actually was announced to the national collegiate basketball Hall of Fame class

of 2026. which, you know, good for Ted Owens. Like I said, really good dude and cool to see him get membership into that class, but also really cool for the University of Kansas that it's just like, oh, yep, we have another Hall of Fame coach, like just add it to the list. You know what I mean? And then the last bit of news here, like I said, very good news from the baseball front for KU. Now, we knew that Gusto, Mungariata and Kate Baldridge did not get drafted

when we talked about it again, to the everydayers. Thank you if you already caught that one yesterday, breaking down the KU baseball roster outlook for this upcoming season. And so the expectation at that point was that they were both going to be back. But you could still sign as an undrafted free agent. Obviously, we're past the time of being able to enter the transfer portal. But they officially announced on social media, basically they're running back. And we're going to be back for another year.

So good to see that, right? Mungariata figures to be in the heart of the lineup for KU this year and already was one of KU's best hitters this past season, was really hot to finish the season. He figures to be the same again this year. And can he take another step forward with the loss? of Tyson LeBlong and potentially Brady Bollinger here. And then you look at Cade Baldrish. Like he had a really good season for KU, and he's somebody who you go back to his Juko stats,

had even better stats than he had this year at Kansas. I think there's another level there that Baldridge can get to. And you clearly saw, you know, with him injured at the end of the year there, it hurt KU toward the end of the season, not having him in the lineup and in that Oklahoma. I mean, if Kate Baldridge is back, like they don't beat Oklahoma. Oklahoma just was ravaging everyone at the end there. like is KU maybe a little bit more competitive?

Certainly maybe. Maybe they had another run on the board or something like that. But he's a good player and important to get both of those guys back. He's a good player on both ends of the field. So we'll continue to monitor what's going on with the KU baseball team and where the roster decisions are going. But two big pieces returning for the Jayhawks in 2027 there. All right.

That'll do for this episode of Lockdown, Jayhawks. You can find our show anywhere you get your podcast, including on our YouTube page where you can like and subscribe to the show. I'll see you next time for another edition. of LOJ.