K-State’s trip to Cincinnati answered one of the biggest preseason questions about this defense, and the answer was ugly. The Wildcats got hammered on the ground Saturday night, giving up 271 rushing yards and watching the Bearcats carve them up in a way that exposed just how vulnerable this group is against a physical run game.
Cincinnati didn’t just move the ball. It moved it with ease.
The Bearcats averaged 7.1 yards per carry, and the lanes were there all night at Nippert Stadium. K-State was getting knocked backward up front, the linebackers were missing their fits too often, and the secondary repeatedly took poor angles once runners got into space.
Gi’Bran Payne was the headliner, ripping off 126 yards on 16 carries after entering the season with 221 yards on 56 carries during his first three years at Notre Dame. Cole Tabb added another punch, going for 124 yards on 11 carries and averaging 11.3 yards per rush after producing 575 yards on 141 carries in his first two seasons at Stanford.
The big-play damage was constant. Cincinnati had nine runs of at least 10 yards, including three that went for 30 or more.
Eighteen of its 37 designed runs gained five yards or better, and 12 picked up at least eight. Over the last two games, Tulane and Cincinnati have combined for 16 runs of 10-plus yards against K-State.
That’s part of a much bigger problem. K-State has now allowed 25 rushing plays of 10 or more yards this season, tied for 128th nationally out of 138 FBS teams.
The Wildcats are 137th in rushing explosives allowed, 136th in second-level yards allowed and 124th nationally and last in the Big 12 in open-field yards allowed. Their defensive line has been credited with 3.04 line yards per carry, which ranks 15th in the Big 12 and 92nd nationally.
The Cincinnati run game also cracked open the passing game. When the Bearcats did throw, quarterback JC French IV was efficient and explosive, finishing 8 of 13 for 165 yards. Cincinnati hit completions of 64 yards, 39 yards and 32 yards.
The numbers were especially brutal when stacked against K-State’s offense. The Wildcats ran 80 plays to Cincinnati’s 51 and still finished with only 11 more total yards.
The Bearcats averaged more than 8.5 yards per play, the most given up by a K-State defense since the snow game against Iowa State in 2023, when the Cyclones averaged 13.9 yards per play on just 35 snaps. That 8.5 mark was the fourth-most allowed by a K-State defense since the start of the 2019 season, not counting the 2020 pandemic year.
Cincinnati started slowly, punting on its first three possessions while averaging under 4.8 yards per play. After that, the game tilted hard.
Over the next six drives, the Bearcats scored 31 points, averaged 5.2 points per drive and piled up 375 yards on 35 plays, good for 10.7 yards per play. K-State was fortunate the damage wasn’t even worse; Cincinnati appeared on the verge of pushing the total to 38 points before a red-zone fumble let the Wildcats hang around.
Now the pressure shifts to the bye week, where first-year defensive coordinator Jordan Peterson and his staff have work to do. The concern isn’t just what happened in Cincinnati.
It’s what comes next. Houston is up after the break on Oct. 10, and the Cougars could stress K-State even more on the ground.
Houston ranks 12th nationally with 248 rushing yards per game and 11th with 6.1 yards per carry.
The Cougars bring a loaded backfield look, too, with dual-threat quarterback Connor Weigman, who ran for over 800 non-sack yards in 2025, plus running backs Makhi Hughes and Re’Shaun Stanford, who can break a game open in a hurry. If K-State decides to sell out against the run, Houston also has a passing threat ready to punish that approach in preseason First Team All-Big 12 wide receiver Amare Thomas.
The tape from Cincinnati made the issue plain. Whether K-State can clean it up over the next two weeks, or whether this is a deeper personnel problem, is now one of the defining questions of the 2026 season.
In Other News...
Kansas State Suddenly Has A Big 12 Problem It Can't Ignore
The loss to Cincinnati left Kansas State with more than just a mark in the standings. Collin Klein made it clear afterward that the Wildcats have a run-defense issue to clean up, after the Bearcats rolled up 271 rushing yards on 38 carries and controlled enough of the game to leave Manhattan with a 31-26 win. Gi'Bran and Cole Tabb fueled that ground attack, giving Kansas State a long afternoon trying to slow things down at the line of scrimmage.
Klein also pointed to the offense's stalled drives as part of why the Wildcats came up short, which only adds to the pressure heading into the stretch ahead. For a team with Big 12 aspirations, getting pushed around on the ground is the kind of problem that can follow you if it is not corrected quickly, especially when the margin for error is already getting thinner. [Read more 🡒]
Cincinnati Just Made The Kind Of Big 12 Statement Fans Needed
Cincinnatis first Big 12 game of the season delivered exactly the kind of message the league tends to notice, and Kansas State was on the wrong side of it. The Bearcats pushed through an early deficit, leaned on their run blocking and got important production on the ground from GiBran Payne and Cole Tabb. For a team trying to show it can handle life in this conference, the win mattered plenty, and it lifted Cincinnati to 4-0 for the first time since 2021.
For Kansas State, the loss serves as an early reminder that Big 12 openers can turn fast when the other side starts controlling the line of scrimmage. Cincinnatis second-half response was the difference, and it left the Wildcats having to sort through how a game they led early slipped away. In a league where every road test can turn into a statement opportunity, this one belonged to the Bearcats. [Read more 🡒]
Kansas State Wasted A Huge Day With One Crushing Mistake
Derrick Salley Jr. gave Kansas State plenty to build on with a huge afternoon against Cincinnati, piling up seven catches for 140 yards and a touchdown in a game that had the Wildcats in position to make a statement. For most of the day, he looked like the kind of difference-maker who can tilt a close Big 12 matchup, giving the passing game a needed spark and keeping Kansas State within reach.
Collin Klein, though, knows the Wildcats were left to rue one costly sequence. Salleys fumble on the first play of the second half swung the momentum toward Cincinnati and helped turn a promising spot into a 31-26 loss. It was the kind of mistake that can erase a big individual performance in a hurry, and Kansas State now has to sort out how to pair production with cleaner execution when the margin is this thin. [Read more 🡒]