Takeaways from Kansas State football’s bowl-clinching victory over Colorado

It’s been a long and frustrating year for the Kansas State football team, but the Wildcats were in a celebratory mood as they walked off the field Saturday at Bill Snyder Family Stadium.

K-State defeated Colorado 24-14 on a cold and wet afternoon in the final game of the regular season.

The reward: a bowl game.

K-State (6-6, 5-4 Big 12) clinched bowl eligibility and a winning conference record with a gritty performance that featured hard rushing yards from Joe Jackson and strong play from Chris Klieman’s defense against Colorado (3-9, 1-8 Big 12).

K-State will wait to learn its bowl destination. An announcement will come on Dec. 7.

Until then, here are takeaways from Saturday’s action against the Buffaloes:

Joe Jackson had another strong game

Last week, K-State running back Joe Jackson sprinted his way into the record books by rushing for a whopping 293 yards and three touchdowns against Utah.

No football player in K-State history has rushed for more yards in a single game than Jackson.

What did he have in store for an encore?

Jackson rushed for 142 yards and three touchdowns on 26 carries against Colorado.

He was unable to break free for explosive runs and long gains like he did against the Utes, but these were arguably tougher yards. He still put up a fine stat line in difficult conditions. Everyone knew he was going to run the ball when snow began to fall during warmups. Colorado loaded up defenders near the line of scrimmage to stop him. But he found a way to move the ball.

Klieman was pumped up after all three of his touchdown runs. He even lost his headset running on the field to celebrate his final end-zone plunge for the day.

K-State got creative with extra blockers

The Wildcats deployed the opposite of a spread offense against the Buffaloes.

Instead of putting extra wide receivers and tight ends on the field to open up passing lanes, K-State opted to use a wide variety of jumbo packages. More often than not, offensive coordinator Matt Wells sent extra linemen into the huddle to help block for running back Joe Jackson.

Offensive lineman Dylan Villarouel lined up in many different positions, both on the line and in the backfield as a fullback.

In the second half, K-State also sent Uso Seumalo, a 340-pound defensive tackle, onto the field to help open up a hole for Joe Jackson on a short touchdown run.

That strategy yielded mixed results. K-State rushed for 206 yards on 43 attempts. More was expected after the Wildcats ran for a school-record 472 yards last week against Utah.

But on a cold and wet day, the Wildcats decided to go with the toughest lineup possible. It was enough for a win.

The Wildcats are going bowling

Fans are unlikely to gobble up tickets to the lower-tier bowl game that K-State ends up playing in. When the Wildcats began the year ranked No. 17 in the preseason polls, many had higher expectations for this group than simply reaching the postseason.

But several players have publicly said it would mean a great deal for them to take the field in another bowl game.

And it is a decent reward for a team that slumped to 2-4 at the midway point of the season. Some didn’t think they were good enough to finish with six wins at that point.

The Wildcats went 4-2 during the second half of the season to get here.

Where will they end up? Bowl projections have targeted the Independence Bowl, Liberty Bowl, Armed Forces Bowl and others as potential landing spots.

And it’s worth noting that the Independence Bowl had a representative in Manhattan on Saturday for this game. Kickoff for that game is set for 1 p.m. on December 30 in Shreveport, Louisiana.

A Big 12 team will play a Conference USA team. ESPN will televise the game.

This game was for die-hard fans only

Attendance was sparse for K-State’s final game of the regular season.

Understandably so.

This game featured a pair of teams with losing records, and the weather was miserable. Snow fell hard during warmups and wind blew all afternoon. Temperatures were in the low 40s, but it felt colder.

For those reasons, K-State didn’t benefit from a traditional home-field advantage Saturday. But the fans that showed up were still loud at important times and helped the Wildcats on senior day. They got to celebrate with players as they took a victory lap around the stadium and exchanged high-fives on their way into the locker room.

K-State won another game with defense

Outside of two touchdown drives, Colorado found it difficult to move the ball all afternoon against K-State.

The Buffaloes gained 323 yards and came up empty on seven of nine total drives.

Desmond Purnell led the effort with nine tackles, including two for loss. Ryan Davis had three tackles for loss. Donovan McIntosh grabbed an interception.

K-State overpowered Colorado on that side of the ball.

Kellis Robinett

The Wichita Eagle

Kellis Robinett covers Kansas State athletics for The Wichita Eagle and The Kansas City Star. A winner of more than a dozen national writing awards, he lives in Manhattan with his wife and four children.