After having built something over the three season prior, Kansas came back down last year by following up their best record in a decade and a half with a finish at 5-7. That said, Greg McElroy thinks the Jayhawks could get back to that upward trend they were experiencing this fall out of Big 12. […]
After having built something over the three season prior, Kansas came back down last year by following up their best record in a decade and a half with a finish at 5-7. That said, Greg McElroy thinks the Jayhawks could get back to that upward trend they were experiencing this fall out of Big 12.
McElroy tiered the programs in the Big 12 for this upcoming season earlier in the offseason on ‘Always College Football’. He would put Kansas in tier two, as a contender to make the College Football Playoff alongside over half the league with Texas Tech, Kansas State, Arizona State, Iowa State, Utah, Baylor, BYU, and TCU, under the assumption that some things go more their way this year.
“Another team that was very disappointing in the win-loss record from a year ago,” McElroy said of Kansas. “But, when you dive just a little bit deeper, there’s a lot of people that believe Kansas can be back in the mix.”
“If you look at where they were last year, I don’t ever pay super close attention to close losses but the ball bounced away from Kansas last year. I mean, all throughout the season, it’s like everything that could go wrong did and it led to five losses by six points or less,” noted McElroy. “Sometimes that has a way of overcorrecting the following year, and they learn how to finish games, they learn how to avoid that critical mistake and, all of a sudden, they become a much better team when it comes to playing in those close games.”
McElroy was right about that margin that ended up keeping Kansas from their longest bowl streak in their program’s history. The Jayhawks lost five of their seven games by a possession or less, four of which came in the first half of the season where they opened at 1-5.
Now, Rock Chalk has reworked some things for this upcoming year, as they doubled the amount of portal additions they had this offseason as compared to portal subtractions. McElroy also just remains very high on the coaching job by Lance Leipold when factoring them into this conference’s possible playoff mix.
“They’ve also been really, really good at going out and finding pieces in the portal that could be really solid,” said McElroy. “They’ve focused on needs, they’ve focused on depth, and they’ve really tried to emphasize the defensive side along the defensive line and at wide receiver.”
“You have to love, very much, what Lance Leipold has done,” McElroy added. “I think Lance Leipold is one of the better minds in college football as far as figuring out, alright, here’s how we’re going to attack this, here’s what we’re going to do with this.”
If this were to happen for Kansas, McElroy thinks the Jayhawk offense will need to be closer to where it was the two seasons prior when they averaged 35.2 points and 442.5 yards in 2022 and 2023, as compared to 29.7 points and 420.2 yards in 2024. That could be the case for that unit with what all they’ll have back in the interior, namely with QB Jalon Daniels – under the assumption again that he has to stay healthy.
“Jalon Daniels is back at quarterback. That’s massive,” said McElroy. “He has to stay healthy. That’s imperative. If he can’t stay healthy then, any projections that you’re making for Kansas, you can drop the win-total significantly. But, if he is healthy, he’s one of the more dynamic playmakers in all of college football.”
“You got some offensive continuity,” McElroy went on. “The offensive line should be pretty good. They bring back quality pieces from guard to guard…Yes, you lose Devin Neal, all-time leading rusher in the history of the school, but they have a ton of talent in the backfield with the addition of LeShon Williams from Iowa and Daniel Hishaw who’s been good for a really long time.”
Finally, as is the case for several teams in the Big 12, McElroy sees a schedule that allows an opportunity to Kansas. That starts with the return of a long-time rivalry against Mizzou, as well as make-or-break games throughout the course of conference play, from September 6th on.
“The schedule is tough,” said McElroy. “But, at Missouri on September 6th? Probably the most-anticipated game on the Kansas schedule this year – The Border Showdown Rivalry. We haven’t seen it since 2011. To have it back on the schedule this year is good for all of us as college football fans. They’re at Texas Tech on October 11th. They have Kansas State coming to them on October 25th. They’re at Iowa State on November 2nd. They have Utah at home on November 28th. So, think about it. Those are some massive games there in the Big 12 that are kind of scattered throughout but there’s some time between them. It’s not like they have back-to-backs that are going to really stress you out if you’re a Kansas Jayhawk fan.”
“You also go to Arizona, to UCF,” McElroy added. “There’s some tricky hurdle games in there as well.”
After improving throughout the 2020s, Kansas took its first knock on their tenure under Leipold. Still, with how open the conference is, McElroy thinks they only need to get back to that eight or nine-win range to contend in the Big 12 and, with that, play for a possible spot in the CFP.
“In the Big 12, you might only need eight or nine to get to the Big 12 Championship depending on how much chaos there could be throughout the regular season standings,” said McElroy.
“I think Kansas has a chance,” McElroy said. “Last year, maybe we got a little over our skis with anticipating a huge jump from the Jayhawks last year to become a possible College Football Playoff contender. Maybe we were a year early? Maybe this is the year where things start to iron out for Lance Leipold and his team.”
Category: General Sports
