K-State Q&A: Preseason football analysis and realignment options for every Big 12 team
Which of the remaining Big 12 members has the most standalone value to another conference?
That’s an unfair question to ask of schools that are accustomed to life in a major league. No one is out here asking Rutgers, Vanderbilt or Washington State to explain themselves. Alas, it is a popular question these days. For fans, the answer seems to depend on which school they support.
And they all can back up their opinions with reasonable arguments. Given the unpredictable nature of realignment, you can make a case for and against every Big 12 school looking to market itself to other leagues.
That being said, some schools have a stronger case than others.
Let’s break them down before we get to your questions this week.
Baylor
Positives: Waco is in Texas, halfway between Austin and Dallas. The Bears are the defending national champions in men’s basketball and are also a power in women’s basketball. While I think facilities are overrated, a brand new football stadium can’t hurt.
Negatives: Baylor is a small, private and religious school without a huge fan base. The Bears might be a hard sell for a conference like the Pac-12.
Iowa State
Positives: The Cyclones are the one team in the Big 12 that could maybe win its way into a better position this season. Only 11 schools have appeared in the College Football Playoff. It would help Iowa State’s resume if it can became No. 12. ISU also has passionate fans and AAU status.
Negatives: Would the Big Ten consider adding a second team from Iowa? Ames may also be too far away from Texas to sell Iowa State in a bundle with any of the old Big 12 South schools.
Kansas
Positives: Men’s basketball blue blood. AAU member. Third largest athletic budget in the conference. Closest Division I FBS school to Kansas City.
Negatives: Football.
Kansas State
Positives: The Wildcats have won Big 12 championships in baseball, men’s basketball and football within the last decade. The athletic department is completely self funded and its TV ratings for football games are above average. I don’t need to tell you K-State has passionate fans.
Negatives: Would another conference want both KU and K-State? If not, who wins that realignment race? It’s hard to see K-State forming a partnership with anyone else.
Oklahoma State
Positives: Did you know the Cowboys have posted a winning record for 15 consecutive football seasons? They have been the model of consistency under Mike Gundy.
Negatives: Oklahoma State loses a lot of luster when it isn’t paired with Oklahoma.
TCU
Positives: You can always count on the football team being good, if not great. Residing in Fort Worth also seems like an advantage if any other conference wants to expand into Texas.
Negatives: The Horned Frogs could be in trouble if other leagues aren’t interested in small, religious schools.
Texas Tech
Positives: This is the only public Texas college remaining in the Big 12. The Red Raiders have a big enrollment and play in a 60,000-seat stadium. Those factors could make them the most desirable group of the pack.
Negatives: Lubbock isn’t exactly close to major recruiting territories. Politicians in the Lone Star State are also pressuring Texas Tech to partner with Baylor and TCU, which could become an issue. Its academic standards are much lower than what you find in the Pac-12. Football has also been a bit disappointing since Mike Leach left town.
West Virginia
Positives: A perfect geographical fit for the ACC as the most prestigious school in its state. West Virginia also opens up valuable East Coast time slots for teams from outside the region.
Negatives: The Mountaineers are already a geographical stretch for the Big 12. The Pac-12 would be even harder.
As you can see, it’s a wide-open competition with no clear-cut winners or losers. Maybe they are better off working together as the Big Eight, as K-State AD Gene Taylor has said is the current Plan A. The debate will likely go on for quite a while, as realignment chatter has quieted significantly over the past week.
Good thing we’ve got actual K-State football questions on tap to keep us occupied this week. Let’s get to them.
I like what you did there. So much so that I will answer both questions.
My guess (and that’s all it is) on K-State’s future conference: The Big 12. The odds of the remaining eight teams rebuilding the league via expansion or an alliance with the Pac-12 seems more likely to me than any other possibility at the moment.
My dining plans in DFW: I can tell you that I have plans to hit up Pecan Lodge with one of my friends who lives in the area. That will be fun. Otherwise, my meal choices will probably depend on how close I am to Torchy’s and Whataburger.
Chris Klieman has said a few times now that he would ideally like to give Deuce Vaughn as many as 25 touches per game. It’s a fun idea, but I don’t think we will see things play out that way.
That’s never been his style.
His teams at North Dakota State and K-State have both featured a rotation of running backs, regardless of how good their most talented runner just so happened to be.
Vaughn was far and away the team’s best running back last season, but his 123 carries weren’t that far ahead of Harry Trotter (72) or Will Howard (78), if you want to include the QB as a ball-carrier.
That won’t change this season, especially if Joe Ervin and Jacardia Wright are both ready to contribute, as the coaching staff has indicated.
Ervin is a small, fast, shifty runner who coaches were very high on before Vaughn arrived on campus. He’s going to play.
Wright is a big, strong, physical runner who can gain yards between the tackles. That is not Vaughn’s forte, so he’s going to see action as a change-of-pace runner.
K-State also likes to use formations with multiple running backs in the backfield. Remember the diamond formation with three running backs?
As versatile as Vaughn is as a receiver, I’m thinking the emergence of Ervin and Wright will allow him to spend more time catching passes. Ideally, it will also reduce carries for Skylar Thompson.
Vaughn will be on the field more than any other running back, but they are all going to play. I imagine things working similar to what we saw two seasons ago between James Gilbert, Jordon Brown and Trotter. The only difference is Vaughn will probably get a little more star treatment than Gilbert did back then.
There’s no good reason why why K-State coaches can’t run everything they want this season.
This will be their third year in Manhttan. They have an experienced quarterback leading the offense. They have a dynamic running back. They have an experienced offensive line.
You could give them a pass last year, because of COVID-19 and Thompson’s injury and five new starters up front. But those excuses are no more.
The only thing that could hold the offense back is mediocre receiver play. Speaking of ...
The receiver position will be a major concern until players like Malik Knowles and Chabastin Taylor prove they can consistently contribute at a Big 12 level.
K-State didn’t have a single playmaker on the perimeter last season until Knowles got things going late.
Taylor led the entire group with 19 catches for 293 yards and a touchdown. I mentioned those numbers to a former K-State receiver the other day and he responded by saying “that was one game for Tyler Lockett.”
That’s not what you want to hear.
But there are some reasons for optimism. Knowles, when healthy, is a talented player. Landry Weber looked really good in the slot at K-State’s open practice last week. Junior college transfer Tyrone Howell has upside, but there’s no way he has mastered the playbook yet. Phillip Brooks has all the tools to be good. Keenan Garber has improved.
It sounds like Taylor needs more time to fully rehab from a torn ACL, though. That could be problematic if he is limited during nonconference games.
I don’t really care about depth at that position. K-State needs one or two stars to make big plays. A lot may depend on Knowles.
No, this team does not remind me of the 2003 Wildcats.
K-State entered that year coming off an 11-2 campaign and was ranked No. 7 in the preseason poll. This team is coming off a 4-6 record and didn’t receive a single vote in the preseason USA Today Coaches poll.
They are about as far apart as teams can get, in that respect.
But you do make a few good other points. Skylar Thompson and Deuce Vaughn may not be Ell Roberson and Darren Sproles, but they are a good QB/RB combo.
If K-State can get some improved production from its receivers (far from a given), I think the Wildcats could surprise a lot of people on offense.
The defense, especially linebacker, is a question mark. But K-State does know how to beat Oklahoma better than any other team in the conference.
I think the Wildcats have enough talent to shatter their Vegas over/under total of 5 1/2 and make a run at seven, eight or maybe even nine victories if everything lines up perfectly.
The better comparison for me is the 2016 team that coincidentally wasn’t picked to do much with a QB (Jesse Ertz) coming back from injury and also opened against Stanford. That team went 9-4.
Does the K-State football team deserve to be ranked in the preseason poll?
Of course not.
Anyone expecting the Wildcats to earn a national ranking coming off five-straight losses and a 4-6 season is looking at things through purple-colored lenses. Maybe Alabama or Notre Dame would get that kind of treatment from voters, but it’s hard for K-State to earn preseason respect even when the team is fresh off a good season.
That being said, I can kind of see how some K-State fans feel snubbed by not even receiving a single vote. Fifty nine different teams received at least one vote, and it’s fair to say the Wildcats are one of the nation’s top 59 teams.
I don’t think that is worth complaining about, though.
If K-State can get its offense humming again, it will have a shot at running the table in nonconference play against Stanford, Southern Illinois and Nevada. Do that, and the Wildcats will have a more legitimate claim for a spot in the top 25.
Here’s guessing there’s something like a 60% chance that K-State has a sellout crowd for its home opener against Southern Illinois.
The Wildcats will have a nice crowd there, regardless of whether it hits 50,000 or not. Fans have been eager to watch K-State football in person in a normal environment since 2019, so they won’t pass up their first opportunity to #RefillTheBill.
Random thought: I wonder what Bill Snyder thinks of fans calling the stadium “The Bill” right now.
But I don’t know if it will technically reach sellout status or not. A lot may depend on if K-State beats Stanford, because it’s easier to sell tickets coming off a win. COVID-19 will also be a factor. Some fans may not be ready to cram into a stadium filled with strangers for three hours.
One thing I can tell you is that the Shamrock Zone and the band’s new home in the student section won’t significantly change seating capacity.
Jake Rubley seems happy to spend a redshirt season behind Skylar Thompson.
Will Howard also seems willing to embrace the backup QB role for a little while, especially if it includes some playing time in a change-of-pace role.
So I don’t see either one of those young quarterbacks leaving anytime soon.
But one of them will likely transfer eventually. The winner of the 2022 QB competition will definitely stay. The loser will probably consider a transfer. That’s just the way things work anymore.
The chances of that happening are zero.
Kansas will win a national championship in football before any school willingly leaves the SEC, especially for a conference with an uncertain future like the Big 12.
The time to add Louisville was 10 years ago, when they were in a fight with West Virginia for Big 12 membership. In hindsight, the conference would probably be in better shape today had it added both schools, plus BYU, Houston or UCF. Or maybe it could have made a play for the Arizona schools.
If the Big 12 stays together, it can still probably add any of the middle three schools I mentioned via expansion. But Arizona, Arizona State and Louisville feel like hard passes.
The only way any school residing in a power conference looks to join the Big 12 is if they get kicked out of their current league, which seems incredibly unlikely.
Well, as I’ve said before, most of the remaining Big 12 teams would stick out like a sore thumb.
Your North Division, sadly, looks like the division to avoid for road trips.
I would much rather work in the West Division. Regular trips to Honolulu, Las Vegas and San Diego sound incredible. Even Provo, Utah and Ft. Collins, Colo. have their charms.
South Division would be fun for anyone who lives in Texas.
Southeast Division has some appeal, but I’ve had bad experiences in New Orleans and have been to Memphis too many times already, so I guess you could say I would rather stay where I am in the North Division.
That is most definitely a collector’s item. But it has been for quite a few years already, unfortunately.
If you sold that at a garage sale, I would strongly consider buying it.