Kansas State didn’t just beat Kansas on the ground Saturday. The Wildcats made a statement with it.
After four games in which the Jayhawks had allowed just 400 rushing yards total, KU’s run defense unraveled in the Sunflower Showdown. Kansas State rolled up 359 yards on 51 carries and averaged 7.0 yards per attempt, turning a strength into a liability in a game that exposed how shaky things can get when the front seven gets pushed back.
Quarterback Avery Johnson set the tone immediately, ripping off 59 yards on K-State’s first play. He did most of his damage on scrambles, with 57% of his rushing yards coming that way, but he also had a designed 37-yard run that helped put the game out of reach. Running back Joe Jackson finished the hammer job, carrying 21 times for 137 yards and a touchdown in the final 21 minutes and 36 seconds alone.
Kansas coach Lance Leipold didn’t sugarcoat it afterward. He said the Jayhawks got “pushed around” and admitted, “They were more physical than we were today in that regard, it sure appeared,” adding, “I’ve got to dive into it more as we watch and see where it’s at.”
The issues were not subtle. Kansas did not record a tackle for loss on a running back all day, and of its three tackles for loss overall, one was a sack and two came against Johnson behind the line of scrimmage. That kept Kansas State in manageable down-and-distance situations and opened the door for long, methodical possessions, including a late fourth-quarter drive that chewed five minutes off the clock with 10 straight runs and ended in a game-sealing field goal.
The biggest backbreaker may have come earlier in the fourth quarter. Right after Isaiah Marshall threw a red-zone interception, Jackson burst through the right side of the Jayhawks’ defensive line and sprinted for 64 yards before Taylor Davis forced him out of bounds. It was the kind of sequence that echoed KU’s loss to Utah, when the Jayhawks failed on fourth-and-goal at the 1-yard line and then almost immediately surrendered a 90-yard rushing touchdown.
Leipold said the Wildcats’ early success changed the feel of the game. “As we talked all week, you got to try to contain Avery Johnson the best you can,” he said, “and we didn’t do that very well, especially right away in the first quarter, and you could see their confidence rise with some big plays.”
Defensive tackle Blake Herold pointed to the kind of corrections D.K. McDonald has been making all season, and figures the defensive coordinator will have more teaching moments coming.
“If we’re not being physical enough, he’s going to tell us ‘Be more physical,'” Herold said. “If we’re out of our gap, (he’s) going to tell us ‘Just do your job,’ and ‘Eyes on your keys,’ stuff like that.”
Herold said the fix starts with the basics and with a more consistent edge during the week.
“I just think we got to play more physical, play harder and kind of do our jobs,” he said. “Guys popping into the gaps, stuff like that, kind of killed us today. Continue to do our jobs and do what we got to do and continue to be physical throughout the week during practice as well.”
Leipold summed up the day bluntly: “That’s not what we expect, that’s not what we wanted, that’s not how we play.”
“For a group that’s played pretty well,” he added, “we got to be better upfront.”
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