2023 Kansas Jayhawks Football Preview

If you read my season preview, the 4-0 Jayhawks are no surprise to you. Nor will you be surprised when they knock off at least one of the preseason Big 12 favorites this year. If they knock off two or three, they are the Big 12 favorite. Stranger things have happened in a league that has seen Baylor and TCU rise from the trash heap to win the league.

Last year’s 55-14 Texas win in Lawrence is as irrelevant to this game as the 2021 Kansas win in Austin. Both are lazy media talking points for morons. These aren’t the same teams and the carry over players from both teams are better or being deployed differently.

The Sunflower State has become a cradle of coaching with Lance Leipold at Kansas and Chris Kleiman at Kansas State. Both men serve as proof that hiring unsexy proven winning football coaches from Division II, the FCS and G5 to mid tier developmental programs that can’t sign Top 20 recruiting classes translates a hell of a lot better to on-field success than familiar name coaching retreads and the hot young thing of the moment. Don’t worry. Most athletic directors will still hire whoever the media and their alums tells them to hire based on a College Gameday segment.

Kansas Offense

The Jayhawks boast the 2nd best group of skill personnel in the Big 12 (behind Texas) and their offense under Andy Kotelnicki is consistently brilliant and creative. They disguise basic concepts well but are also not shy about playing wild games with spacing, line splits, crazy backfield action and bypassing opponent strengths and targeting weaknesses in unique and clever ways.

The best defense against their illusions? Good personnel who understand their position in the defense and the defensive call. Win the line of scrimmage, tackle well, communicate, do your job. Don’t get into guessing games or sweat all of the window dressing.

It’s important to understand that the 2023 Kansas offense has been stressing ball control, patience and time of possession (11th in the nation) to protect their defense and exert game control. Texas has to get them off of the field, even at the risk of Jalon Daniels getting some shots downfield.

The Texas game plan won’t begin with “stopping Jalon Daniels.” It will begin with stopping the Jayhawk running game and the RPOs that flow from it. Daniels is the conduit. Kansas converts an amazing 60% on third down. If that somehow sustains against the Longhorns, Texas will need to put 42 on the board.

Jalon Daniels is a very good dual threat QB. The Jayhawk offense has evolved sufficiently that they don’t have to involve his legs against bad teams to move the ball and they can save him for critical moments in contests like this Saturday. Daniels is a very capable RPO thrower and he’s good in play action. He thrives less in pure drop back situations and uses his legs to extend the play and freestyle, but the results of that are often pretty good for them.

For the year, he’s averaging 9.4 yards per attempt as a thrower with 5 touchdowns and one interception. He only has 27 carries so far. Jason Bean is the best experienced back up in the league, which offers KU some peace of mind. Both throwers have a passing game bias to the middle of the field. They’re completing 83.3% of their throws between the hashes, which is fairly extraordinary but speaks to the nature of their heavy RPO influenced and post/slant passing game.

On deep throws outside of the hashes, they are 2 of 8 for 72 yards. Not ineffective, but erratic.

When they throw to the flats, it’s a screen, swing pass or a stop route. 15 yard deep outs ain’t on the Kansas menu.

Devin Neal and Daniel Hishaw are one of the most effective duos in college football. Both guys weigh 215+, both can catch the ball well and they’re tough run maximizers. Hishaw does have a fumbling habit which will get him benched from time to time. They’re both averaging just under 7 yards per carry. Kansas attacks all areas of the field in the run game, but they have a bias towards the edges, collectively accounting for 409 rushing yards on 47 carries, a 8.7 yards per carry average. They run a lot of toss sweep, option and some outside zone, so a Baylor style game plan of playing Broughton or Collins on the edge means that the play side safety and corner need to protect the edge if it becomes a foot race.

WR/TE

Luke Grimm, Quentin Skinner and Lawrence Arnold return from last year. Good RPO guys with complementary skills and body types. There isn’t a true #1. The ball goes to the open guy or the mismatch. Mason Fairchild is the big 260 pound tight end who has a knack for getting loose up the seam. Jared Casey plays fullback or H-back and he does the dirty work in two tight end sets. Everyone is above average to pretty good, which in aggregate can be pretty dangerous.

The strength of the unit is their tackles and their clear weakness is the interior, both in run blocking and pass protection. Starting right guard Michael Ford was injured against BYU and missed practice Monday. He’s questionable to return, but any loss of their experienced starters is a problem as Kansas lacks depth there. Texas will have a favorable mismatch inside, but Kansas is very clever about giving their OL manageable jobs and avoiding or minimizing troublesome defenders rather than banging their heads against the wall.

DEFENSE

The Jayhawks have improved considerably from last year with new personnel, the development of their returning personnel and better schemes from defensive coordinator Brian Borland.

They are much more physical at every level and they’re surrendering only 5.0 yards per play and under 300 yards per game to their opponents. They’ve also forced seven turnovers in four games, two of them for scores.

Have they been tested by any quality offenses? No. But bad and average offenses used to work them over pretty good. Texas will be their first real measuring stick.

Last year Kansas had 12 sacks in 13 games. This year they have 11 through 4 games. The biggest reason is an improved DL from the transfer portal, particularly Minnesota edge transfer Devin Booker. He’s a 6-5, 245 pounder and a good situational pass rusher. Overall quality has improved as well. The interior DL is 4 guys in rotation. They play hard, jam stuff up and have occasional flash plays. The strength of that group is Tommy Dunn and Colorado State transfer Devin Phillips. Minnesota transfer Gage Keys has been solid, too.

The Kansas front Texas ran at will against last year doesn’t exist any more and they’re currently limiting opponents to 3.3 yards per carry.

A relative weakness. Taiwan Berryhill has been out and won’t return until the USA formally recognizes him. Rich Miller and JB Brown are just OK. The Jayhawks can be exploited in coverage here against Texas running backs and tight ends and I wouldn’t be surprised to see that encompass the early game plan. I also like the idea of attacking their tackling and decision making with split duo and counter gaps in the run game.

BYU had great success throwing to their tight end against this group last week.

The obvious strength of the defense. Cobee Bryant is the best corner in the league. He already has two picks and forced a fumble on a big hit against BYU that he scooped for six points. Long with good hips and fearless in man coverage. You can fool him at times and get deep, but he’ll go for the pick six whenever he feels he can get it. The most noticeable improvement has come from the other cornerback Mello Dotson, who is also playing at a very high level.

Kenny Logan was being played out of place last year and his performance suffered. Now the veteran (49 career starts) is being played more like a traditional strong safety and he’s thriving.

Safety OJ Burroughs loves to hit and can absolutely bring it, but he seems to blow 1-3 coverages a game.

Neither Logan or Burroughs want to be matched up 1 on 1 against Worthy or Mitchell. Texas has to find some ways to get the KU corners occupied so that the best Horn pass catchers can get safety match ups.

Finally, the HAWK (sort of their nickel) Craig Young completes the unit. He’s 6-3, 225 and very explosive, but he can be exploited in coverage. Sound like Baylor’s oversized nickel from last week? Similar deal. If KU trots him out there, their run defense and pass rush improves, but coverage declines markedly. If they sub him out for 190 pound Kwinton Lassiter, the opposite happens. Take note.

Final

Kansas will finish the year as a legitimate Top 20 team if they can stay healthy. They’ve faced an easy schedule (Illinois isn’t good, BYU is a bottom half of the league B12 team) but the progress that they’ve made on defense and their shift to a more ball dominating offensive style is blindingly obvious. Texas has to protect the passer and attack their linebackers and safety/nickel spots. Penalties and turnovers are the obvious aids for Kansas to stop Texas and turn 6s in to 3s and 3s into punts. Sark needs to make KU’s safeties, nickel and linebackers do stuff Kansas doesn’t want them doing.

Defensively, the Horns can’t consent to being ball controlled and have to get off of the field on 3rd down. If Texas can stop the Jayhawk running game with two safeties standing back watching, KU is going to have a very narrow path for offensive success.

On special teams, let’s try not to drop two punts in the red zone or miss chip shot field goals?

Texas better bring it. The Jayhawks are no joke. But if Texas doesn’t dig a hole early, better depth will win out over time.

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