Five things we learned from Kansas State’s gritty 38-17 victory over Nevada
No Skylar Thompson. No problem.
The Kansas State football team overcome the absence of its starting quarterback and defeated Nevada 38-17 to complete a perfect run through the nonconference portion of its schedule and improve to 3-0 on Saturday at Bill Snyder Family Stadium.
The Wildcats pulled away from the Wolf Pack with three touchdown drives in the fourth quarter. Sophomore quarterback Will Howard engineered all three of them. Then K-State’s defense took over to clinch victory by forcing Nevada’s offense and star quarterback Carson Strong off the field in frustrating fashion.
Here are a few takeaways from the game before K-State looks ahead to its Big 12 opener at Oklahoma State:
Plenty of good (and bad) from K-State’s quarterbacks
Will Howard and Jaren Lewis played well enough for the Wildcats to win.
There isn’t much more you can say about K-State’s quarterbacks.
Neither one of them had a spectacular performance. Neither one of them looked dreadful. They were somewhere in the middle.
Howard didn’t do anything flashy, aside from connecting with Daniel Imatorbhebhe for a 68-yard touchdown on the second play of the game. He connected on 7 of 10 passes for 123 yards to go along with 56 yards and a pair of touchdowns on the ground.
But he was oddly benched after three drives in favor of Lewis, who came in and led the Wildcats to a touchdown and then a field goal on back-to-back drives while mostly handing the ball off to backup running back Joe Ervin. Lewis completed 2 of 3 passes for just 6 yards.
The quarterback switch seemed weird, given that Howard wasn’t playing poorly. Things got even more strange in the third quarter when the Wildcats went back to Howard and they stuck with him the rest of the way.
K-State coach Chris Klieman later explained that he decided to play both quarterbacks well before hand, saying that Lewis has looked so good in practice that he deserved to see some action in this game.
Bottom line: Howard and Lewis did exactly what K-State coaches asked of them. Neither of them committed a turnover, and they both did enough things right to help the Wildcats win with a ground-oriented attack that produced 269 rushing yards.
It wasn’t pretty by any means, but the Wildcats will take it until Thompson returns.
Running backs to the rescue
Deuce Vaughn gave fans another scintillating stat line that featured 127 yards and a touchdown on 23 carries.
But he wasn’t the only K-State running back who got in on the fun against Nevada. Ervin came off the bench and rushed for an impressive 82 yards and a touchdown on 11 carries.
He was at his best in the first half when he took the Wolf Pack by surprise and averaged 10.4 yard per touch. He also punched in a highlight run of 22 yards for a touchdown in the second quarter.
The Wildcats didn’t need outstanding play from their quarterbacks when they could both simply give the ball to Vaughn and Ervin.
Third-quarter blues
K-State has never been a good third-quarter team under coach Chris Klieman, and that has particularly been true this season.
The Wildcats have only scored three points in the third quarter all year, and they once again looked sluggish coming out of halftime against Nevada.
After taking a 17-7 lead into the locker room, the Wolf Pack stormed back and tied the score at 17-17 in the third quarter. The game was very much in doubt without Thompson available to light a fire under the offense.
K-State responded in the fourth quarter and won by double digits, but its third-quarter slump continued. It’s hard to explain why that continues to be an issue.
As good as advertised
Credit Joe Klanderman and K-State’s defense for coming up with a scheme that held Strong and his arsenal of talented wide receivers to a measly 17 points. Because Strong lived up to the hype in this game, completing a handful of passes downfield into tiny holes like a legit NFL prospect.
This was arguably K-State’s finest defensive effort of the season.
K-State held Strong to 237 yards and a touchdown. Tee Denson intercepted one of his passes in the second quarter.
Injury updates
Senior quarterback Thompson was unable to play in this game while he recovers from a knee injury, but he was healthy enough to watch from the sideline in street clothes.
Thompson, wearing a large brace on his right knee, was with his teammates during pregame warm-ups and supported them until the final whistle. He appeared to walk around the field comfortably, which suggests he may not miss many more games before he’s ready to return to action.
K-State had some less encouraging injury news elsewhere, though. Junior defensive end Khalid Duke had to leave the game in the second quarter with an injury to his left leg and was unable to return. Starting offensive lineman Josh Rivas also had to leave the game in the fourth quarter with a lower-body injury, but he was able to return.
The Wildcats could be without three key players next week against the Oklahoma State Cowboys.
This story was originally published September 18, 2021 at 4:37 PM.