(This version of the original column was updated and trimmed for publication in the 3/5 Points section of the Dallas Morning News print edition.)

The coach of the nation's No. 1 college basketball team, the University of Kansas Jayhawks, must be thanking his lucky stars that Baylor continues to make headlines for all the wrong reasons.

Lost in the daily drama that Baylor University provides is the sorry state of affairs within the Jayhawks athletics operation, especially its blue-blood basketball program, run by coach Bill Self.

The off-the-court Jayhawks behavior seems to be getting a free pass from the nation's opinion writers, perhaps because there's only so much bandwidth on the sports-scandal beat.

The incidents reported at Kansas don't come anywhere close to the sexual-assault atrocities that took place at Baylor. And as a Baylor graduate who has been unflinchingly critical of my alma mater for the past 19 months, my aim is not to deflect attention from what's happening in Waco.

But the Baylor scandal is a story of more than one university: It is the latest example of what can happen when sports gets too big on any campus. And sports is too big at scores of schools coast to coast.

That's why we can't brush aside the Kansas story, or the others sure to emerge, with the excuse that it's not as egregious as what's happened at Baylor.

Austin-based investigative writer Jessica Luther, author of Unsportsmanlike Conduct: College Football and the Politics of Rape, explains it like this: "I would hope that if we've learned anything from Baylor, it is that it's important and necessary to ask questions. Smoke does not mean fire, but it could, in fact, mean an inferno. And we owe it to the students at these schools to press the people in charge to answer for the smoke."

And there's been plenty of smoke wafting from the venerable Allen Fieldhouse in Lawrence, Kan.

In what's been a season of sketchy behavior by KU basketball players, here's the latest, as reported by the Kansas City Star:

A KU sophomore basketball standout has had her game minutes cut nearly in half since she called Lawrence police in December to complain that her car was vandalized by a star on the men's team.

Freshman Josh Jackson, a top Jayhawks scorer and likely a high NBA draft pick, was charged Feb. 24 with misdemeanor property damage to McKenzie Calvert's vehicle.

Self, among the most Teflon-coated of college coaches, maintains that Jackson was disciplined but won't provide details. We do know this: Self says Jackson won't miss any future games, nor has he missed any so far this season.

In fact, Self also went one tone-deaf step further and called Jackson "a great ambassador for the university."

An odd characterization on the heels of police action.

In contrast, Calvert, the leading scorer for the women's team in five of its first eight games, is becoming something of a stranger to the basketball court. Most troubling, no one at KU -- neither coaches, athletic department nor administration -- will say why she's seeing less playing time.

This information vacuum and a school's nothing-to-see-here attitude allows fears of all sorts of worst-case scenarios to take root.

According to witnesses, Calvert threw a drink on Jackson's teammate, Lagerald Vick, as she left a Lawrence bar Dec. 9. Jackson followed her to her car and as they argued, he kicked the driver's door and taillight, resulting in the damage charge.

And in case anyone is concerned that Jackson's legal trouble might dampen the Jayhawks' march through the March tournament, he won't be arraigned until seven business days after the NCAA championship game.

The other Kansas basketball player in the bar incident, Vick, made his own headlines in January after a KU investigation determined that he "likely" hit Calvert on the arm multiple times and kicked her in the face in December 2015. The review determined that Vick probably committed domestic violence and recommended a two-year probation period, according to the Star.

Whether Vick was actually disciplined by the university or the basketball program is anybody's guess. With March Madness fast approaching, Vick and Jackson simply play on.

Trouble related to the Jayhawks program doesn't stop there. An alleged rape of a 16-year-old was reported to have occurred the night of Dec. 17 at McCarthy Hall, an all-male apartment that houses 38 students, including the men's basketball team.

The sexual assault investigation drags on, and, months later, still no details about a suspect have been released. Among the little known details is that five people listed as witnesses in the police report are members of the Jayhawks squad: Jackson, Vick, Frank Mason III, Mitch Lightfoot and Tucker Vang.

Self says he has no information from that incident that would warrant any suspension.

Campus police did seize "two glass smoking devices with residue" in a search of McCarthy Hall after the reported rape. Sophomore basketball player Carlton Bragg was charged with possession of drug paraphernalia but reached a diversion agreement in municipal court.

He served a three-game suspension for a "violation of team rules." Police said there is no indication that the paraphernalia is related to the sexual assault case

Add all those incidents up and, at the least, the optics are terrible. Given the heightened concerns about the intersection of college athletics and violence against women, it's curious that the criticism has been largely muted about the Jayhawks' transgressions.

Again, from Luther's perspective, "From Baylor to Minnesota to Tennessee and beyond, there are patterns in how programs and fans try to shoo away inquiries and redirect attention, which comes at the expense of student safety."

KU's beloved basketball team isn't its only athletics program that's sported players behaving badly. A former Hockaday student and Kansas varsity rower filed a lawsuit last spring alleging that she was raped by a KU football player and that the university failed to protect her from harassment by her attacker.

The ongoing lawsuit, one of two filed by rowers against the same player, who was later banned from campus, includes numerous allegations about ways in which female Kansas athletes are taught to "submit to the school's male athletes."

Has anything changed since those lawsuits were filed? Earlier this year, the KU football coaching staff decided to pass on a former Boise State football player suspended for his involvement in an alleged sexual assault at that school.

Sad to say, but that's what passes for good news about the treatment of women in the win-at-all-costs world of college athletics.

Sharon Grigsby is a member of The Dallas Morning News Editorial Board. Email: sgrigsby@dallasnews.com.