ON A MISSION
want to soar
hgreenstein@ljworld.com
Kansas head coach Lance Leipold got told early in his career, in particular, that he didn’t enjoy wins enough. “I always felt that that was already over and something new was on the horizon,” he said at the start of KU’s 2024 fall camp. “I think you’ve got to find that balance but stay always great on all these sayings, so I apologize — it’s why the windshield’s bigger than the rear-view mirror, or something like that.”
After a landmark 2023 season, Leipold and the leaders of this year’s veteran football team — a group with
more than 30 seniors in total, many of whom lifted KU to where it is now, a vastly more successful program than when Leipold arrived in 2021 — have tried to keep their eyes firmly focused on the windshield.
“We don’t have time to be complacent,” said senior running back and Lawrence native Devin Neal. “We don’t have time to mope around or act like we’ve been here before, because we haven’t. We’ve never been a Big 12 championship team, we’ve never been a playoff team.”
The subtext, of course, is that those goals may be within reach of the 2024 squad.
It’s not unreasonable to think so, given the combination of a few factors: that high level of returning experience, the overall upward trajectory (2-10 to 6-7 with a bowl appearance to 9-4 with a bowl win last December) and a favorable schedule in the new-look Big 12. Oklahoma and Texas are gone, replaced by Arizona, Arizona State, Colorado and Utah. And KU, which was picked to finish fourth in the league, only has to play one other member of the top five. It has to go to Manhattan to face Kansas State but does not play Utah, Oklahoma State or Arizona.
Chance Parker/Journal-World File Photo
KANSAS COACH LANCE LEIPOLD walks the field during the first day of spring practice on March 19 in Lawrence.
Carter Skaggs/ The Cincinnati Enquirer
It’s anybody’s game for Nate Lie’s soccer team, as long as they
By Henry Greenstein hgreenstein@ljworld.com
Nate Lie wants to tilt the field.
“We want to be one of the best pressing teams in the country,” said Lie, the first-year Kansas soccer coach.
And therein enters the soccer statistic known as field tilt — what proportion of time does a given team spend in the attacking third, as compared to its opponents? In short, who is getting the majority of offensive opportunities?
“We talk about this concept of field tilt quite a bit,” he said, “in that let’s make it an objective, a stated objective that we play as much of the game towards the opponents’ goal as possible and as little towards ours.”
Lie acknowledges that dominating this particular statistic will require his team to adopt a “high-pressure, relentless approach to defending,” and that partly in service of playing with a certain tempo and pressure, his squad will probably rotate through 18 to 20 players instead of 15 to 17.
“If we are defending deep for large stretches of the game, we’re not having success in that phase of the game that we were intending,” he said. “That’s hard to do. It probably fights a lot of the tendencies that a majority of this group have been accustomed to, but we’re going to try to do that starting game one.”
Lie’s Jayhawks now have one game under their belt, at South Dakota State on Thursday, and will be on the road at Drake today. These are first tentative steps into a new era under Lie, who replaced the 25-year head coach Mark Francis.
Lie comes from Xavier, where he won the Big East three times and reached the NCAA Tournament on four occasions. As he attempts to bring success to KU, he’ll be doing it with a roster that is half Francis-era holdovers and half newcomers.
“I think we’re all starting from scratch at the same time,
BRING THE PRESSURE
figuratively starting at the same starting line,” he said, “and I think it gives everyone sort of an equal shot to succeed and to earn their place on the team and on the field.”
It’ll be a gradual process as they find their way toward the type of soccer Lie hopes to play.
“This style of play only works if everyone’s doing it together at the same time,” he said. “It takes a huge amount of trust that if I do my job, the people behind me will be doing theirs, the people in front of me will be doing theirs, and that if we all do it it’s going to work. And that is easier said than done, both in terms of just that sense of belief deep in your heart, and also the execution, being able to maintain your concentration in the heat and fatigue, and the amount of energy it takes physically to perform.”
A few players have their positions on the team firmly
secured. Returning midfielders Hallie Klanke and Avery Smith and Ohio State transfer defender Brooke Otto are the Jayhawks’ three captains. Smith was an easy pick for Lie because she had served in a leadership role on past teams. Lie said of newcomer Otto, who was in Lawrence in the spring, that she “carries herself with a sense of gratitude, professionalism and she’s very mindful of others, and I think she is a natural relationship builder.”
For Klanke, Lie said, it’s an asset to have been in a previous program, North Carolina, that competes during training in the manner he hopes KU will.
“I think from day one to the end of spring, I think Hallie was as consistent as anyone on the team in her approach, in her performance, in her behaviors as a teammate,” he said, “and that extended from the training field even into the scrimmages,
whether that was communicating on the field or if a player made a mistake, she was the one that you saw just naturally go over to them and give them a pat on the back.” Klanke comes in as KU’s returning point leader, with the most goals (four) and assists (five) of any Jayhawk in 2023. That season featured an offensive dry spell for KU as it scored just five times in 10 league games, only getting about 4.3 shots on goal per game. Smith, Raena Knust (formerly Childers) and Lexi Watts are the only other returning Jayhawks who scored multiple goals last season.
Lie said that in the portal he was looking to build depth while also acquiring players who could have an immediate impact. He ended up with Otto as well as midfielders Emika Kawagishi (NC State), Makayla Merlo (UCCS) and
‘‘
I think we’re all starting from scratch at the same time ... and I think it gives everyone sort of an equal shot to succeed and to earn their place on the team and on the field.”
Emily Tobin (IU Indianapolis), while also picking up some late-arriving freshmen in forward Ebba Cronholm, defender Jordan Fjelstad and forward Shea Ryan. Fjelstad and Ryan were previously signed to Oregon State before the Beavers’ coaching change.
Those three join five Francis signees and three winter additions (including some previous commitments to Lie’s staff at Xavier).
With so many freshmen, Lie will have to hope for a much smaller group of seniors (Mackenzie Boeve, Knust and captains Klanke and Smith) to provide leadership.
“As much as that they can be an extension of the coaching staff would be a huge advantage for a program,” he said.
Goalkeeper Sophie Dawe, who didn’t play as a freshman, staked her claim for the net with a strong and diligent showing in the spring.
KANSAS FORWARD MIKAYLA COORE-PASCAL pursues the ball during the exhibition against Arkansas on Aug. 4 in Fayetteville, Ark.
By David Rodish drodish@ljworld.com
The upcoming cross-country season for Kansas will have a lot of familiarity, as only a handful of seniors depart from KU’s men’s and women’s teams.
The Jayhawks’ top returners are seniors Peter Walsdorf and Kenadi Krueger, who both were the second-fastest Jayhawks running in the Big 12 championship and the NCAA regional championship. Eight of KU’s top 10 men’s runners from the Big 12 Championship will be back this year, and seven of the top 10 women’s runners are returning.
This year’s team includes 22 men and 23 women. KU’s women’s team has many underclassmen, with six freshmen and eight sophomores. The men’s team features six freshmen, six sophomores, eight juniors, one senior and one graduate student.
Last year
The 2023 cross-country season concluded with KU sending two runners to the NCAA Championships after a sixth-place finish in the conference for both the men’s and women’s teams, as well as a ninth-place finish for the men in the NCAA Regional Championships and a 12th-place finish for the women.
FAMILIAR FACES
last year, with the Cowboys winning the men’s 8,000-meter run and the Cougars winning the women’s 6,000-meter run. Each school took second place in the race it did not win.
On the men’s side, the Cowboys had their top five runners — only one of whom didn’t return for the 2024 season — all finish inside the top 10 in the race for a winning score of 25. Their latter two runners placed inside the top 20.
Local ties
KU’s incoming freshman class includes two familiar faces in Lawrence. Ryan Whittlesey and Blake Wohler are from Free State
Both Jayhawks to make it to the NCAA Championships graduated and finished their NCAA crosscountry careers. Lona Latema represented KU in the women’s race and placed 62nd, a major improvement from her 2021 NCAA Championship run where she finished 101st. On the men’s side, Chandler Gibbens placed 77th in his first NCAA Championship run.
High School. Wohler led his team in the 6A state championship with a 16 minute, 6.30 second 5,000-meter run, which was 13th in the state. Whittlesey had the second-best run on the team with a time of 16:29.40 for 30th.
Whittlesey joins two other family members on the team: his older sister Samantha, a junior, and his father, assistant coach Michael Whittlesey.
Dance Gallery Dance Gallery
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The Jayhawks recruited another area local in Eudora’s Sydney Owens. She capped off her high school cross-country career with a first-place finish in the 4A state championship with a time of 18:47.90.
Around the conference
Oklahoma State and BYU dominated the Big 12 Championships
Last year’s top men’s runner, sophomore Brian Musau, will return to Oklahoma State after a successful track and field season in which he set a school record. The Cowboys did lose their seniors Taylor Roe, who won the women’s Big 12 championship, and Molly Born, who placed fifth in the championship.
BYU, which won the women’s Big 12 championship, lost two of its top-four runners. Iowa State, the fourth team in the men’s category and third in the women’s, returns four of its top five men and two of its top five women.
By David Rodish drodish@ljworld.com
It’s a new year but a lot of the same for the Kansas volleyball team in 2024, with 12 returners from last year on a team that has experienced the NCAA Tournament three times in a row.
KU has fielded a competitive volleyball team consistently under coach Ray Bechard, but the 2023 regular season played out particularly well. The Jayhawks went 24-6 — 14-4 in conference play — and narrowly lost 3-2 in the second round of the NCAA Tournament to Penn State.
Bechard said that the Jayhawks were a competitive team that was able to pull out wins in four-set or five-set matches.
That identity is something he expects to carry over into the 2024 season.
The returners include the team’s statistical leaders from last year in kills, aces, attack percentage, blocks, digs and assists. With the returning strength, the Jayhawks could continue the upward trajectory to take the Big 12 and get back to the Sweet 16. Ahead of the team’s official report day, Kansas took the No. 1 spot in the Big 12 preseason poll with six first-place votes.
The majority of KU’s production will return to Lawrence. Ayah Elnady, who led the team in kills and aces, will be a senior after being a first-team allBig 12 selection in 2023. Senior Camryn Turner — a Topeka native — returns after earning Big 12 setter of the year last season, as will senior Toyosi Onabanjo, who led the Jayhawks with 1.03 blocks per set.
“We’re an older team with our seniors,” Bechard said. “We have six that have played together. (With the juniors) I think that’s a good blend of upperclassmen. We have good depth.”
Elnady and Turner are joined by junior London Davis on the Big 12 preseason team, with incoming freshman Zoey Burgess being named the Big 12 preseason freshman of the year.
KU’s success centered on its prolific offense. Among 2023 Big 12 schools, the Jayhawks were first in assists with 12.93 per set (16th in the nation) and first in kills with 13.89 per set (17th in the nation). KU
CROWN
finished second in the conference in both points per set at 17.43 and in hitting percentage at .274 (20th in the nation). It wasn’t just the offense. KU led the conference with the fewest service aces allowed, which in correlation with the team’s conference-leading 15.44 digs per set, showed the defensive prowess of its back line. Sophomore Raegan Burns was the catalyst for that, as she averaged 3.46 digs per set as a freshman. Burns’s freshman year digs total is already 10th in school history in the 25-point rally scoring era (from 2008 to present).
The Jayhawks should be strong in ball control. A fouryear starter at setter will help make that case, but it’s the entire team’s experience playing together that excites Bechard.
“(Last year) we were a little heavy on what we called a pin offense, but we feel like we’ve got more physical middles now that will allow us to create a little more balance offensively,” Bechard said.
Bechard added a lot of height to the team with the freshman class. Three of the six freshmen are 6-foot-3 or
taller, and those three — Burgess, Kenzie Dean and Reese Ptacek — are among the five tallest players on the team. Their height should help improve upon last season’s 2.38 blocks per set, which was fifth-best in the conference.
“Their physicality creates a new opportunity for us to be more physical both offensively and defensively,” Bechard said.
The schedule ahead
KU will start its season on Saturday in an exhibition match against Drake, with the regular season starting on Aug. 30 in the Duke Tournament. The team will compete in three tournaments before conference play, with the final one being hosted in Lawrence from Sept. 19 to Sept. 21.
The Jayhawks will begin conference play in Lawrence on Sept. 25 against UCF and will conclude on Nov. 29 at Iowa State.
KU will face several teams that finished the 2023 season in the American Volleyball Coaches Association top-25 poll. The Jayhawks will host Purdue during the Jayhawk Classic on Sept. 19 and Creighton two
days later. In conference play, KU will play at Arizona State and at home against Baylor, BYU and Houston.
Around the conference
A 14-4 conference record wasn’t enough for the Jayhawks to lead the Big 12 in 2023. Texas, a team that hasn’t lost more than one conference game in a regular season since 2016, won 15 conference games en route to a second straight national championship.
The Texas Goliath won’t be easily toppled, but that isn’t a problem for the Jayhawks any longer. With the Longhorns’ departure to the SEC, the top of the conference has a void that the Jayhawks could fill this fall.
“(Texas leaving) created a new opportunity for a bunch of teams,” Bechard said. “Four or five teams got first-place votes (in the Big 12 preseason poll), and I think we got a few more because we’ve got a little experience coming back. But there’s a ton of teams going to practice that feel like they’re a Big 12 championship-level team.”
Seven teams from the 2023 NCAA Tournament will compete in the Big 12 in 2024. The
only newcomer of those seven is Arizona State, which went 28-7 during JJ Van Niel’s first year in Tempe. The Sun Devils also went furthest among 2024 Big 12 member schools as the only team to advance to the third round of the tournament.
It was the second offseason with conference realignment for the Big 12, with different play styles coming from the various conferences and regions these teams came from. That adds a wrinkle to some of the preparation, but it’s an exciting challenge for a Jayhawk team that was picked to win.
“That’s now eight new teams in the past two years ... That’s pretty significant,” Bechard said. “As I was trying to figure out the voting in the coaches poll, there’s seven, eight, nine teams that can win the conference because there’s a lot of unknown.”
And with the new 12-team playoff format, a Big 12 winner is a national-title contender.
To even put itself in that conversation, KU needs to stay healthy, adapt well to new offensive coordinator Jeff Grimes’ system, find a pass rush from somewhere and get more consistent play from its linebackers. But each position group has reason for optimism ahead of the 2024 campaign.
Quarterbacks: The common refrain from KU coaches throughout the offseason has been that they have been given no indication that Jalon Daniels will be limited in any way during the 2024 season.
Leipold said at Big 12 media days, “Our goal and our expectation is that Jalon will play every snap he’s able to play, dictated by score more than health.”
And after seeing Daniels make a welcome return to 11on-11 work for the first couple of days of fall camp, Grimes said, “I’d love to see him, like everybody, have the opportunity to
be healthy and play every down, and lead our team to a championship. And I have no reason to think that that wouldn’t be the case based on what I’ve seen so far.”
As redemptive and as entertaining as Jason Bean’s late-season run was for KU last year, the return for Daniels is a welcome sight for the Jayhawks and their fans. The junior quarterback went into 2023 with sky-high expectations and the title of Big 12 preseason offensive player of the year. He ended up playing
for her first season.
Addison Tauscher is coming in
just three games after suffering a back injury during training camp that flared up at unpredictable times, at one point thrusting Bean into action as the starter at Texas on less than an hour’s notice.
The result of Daniels’ at times enigmatic absence was the circulation of constant rumors about his future and whether he would ever play again, which he has said took a toll on his mental health. He’s doing much better now: “I feel like right now, I’ve already ramped up to
where I would be if I was playing a game tomorrow,” he said at Big 12 media days.
Bean is gone to the NFL, so Daniels’ presumptive backup is now Cole Ballard, who in 2023 got thrown into the fire as a true freshman and former walk-on and acquitted himself fairly well despite some costly mistakes. Ballard has frequently received praise from coaches and teammates for his maturity and leadership, which was on full display as he started the Sunflower Showdown last year.
Freshman quarterback Isaiah Marshall, renowned for his composure, is often compared to Daniels (which he embraces) and could figure very prominently into the Jayhawks’ future. Running backs: Neal had already carved out enough of a legacy to be remembered fondly by the KU faithful after just three seasons.
The Lawrence native bet on his hometown program, stuck with it through a coaching change before he even made it to campus, and contributed from the opening days of his freshman year through the end of his junior season, helping mold KU into a winning program.
By November of last year, Neal thought he was headed for the NFL Draft. Instead, he realized he wasn’t content leaving just yet, and returned to KU with a good chance to set the Jayhawks’ all-time records for rushing yards and rushing touchdowns. In the offseason, he worked on pass protection and better understanding defenses.
“The intent is the same as it was when he showed up, which has been awesome,” position coach Jonathan Wallace said in the spring. “He is still trying to find little tidbits of what he can do to get better, and that’s one thing that you just love about the kid, is he wants to grow in every aspect of his game.”
Neal’s longtime partner in the backfield, Daniel Hishaw Jr., is also back for another year (and in fact could come back in 2025, too). He’ll provide the same old powerful running with a new digit on his back (No. 9), and he’ll look to string together a full season of production after running for just 213 yards on 61 carries in the final seven games of 2023.
Lie has acknowledged that it will be a process to fit these disparate pieces together. At the beginning, he said, the play style will not “look anywhere near our peak.”
“I’ve told recruits this:
I’m like ‘Feel free to judge us to some extent on games one through five, but I have a sneaking suspicion, and I’ll make a strong bet that we’re much, much, much better in games 10 to 20,’” he said. One key baseline
objective is to make the Big 12 tournament, which will take place at the KC Current’s CPKC Stadium. That means being one of the top 12 teams in the new-look 16-team Big 12, after KU finished 13th of 14 last year.
“I think that’s a fair goal,” he said. “Not an ultimate goal, that doesn’t define a successful season, but I do think I’d be disappointed personally if we didn’t make that Big 12 tournament.”
Less concretely, he said, he wants to see his team “dictate games more and more as the season goes along.” KU is at home for the first time against Tulsa on Thursday and opens Big 12 play at Rock Chalk Park against Iowa State on Sept. 12.
Chance Parker/Journal-World Photo
KANSAS QUARTERBACK JALON DANIELS (6) shakes hands with quarterback TJ Crews IV (19) during the first day of fall camp on July 30 in Lawrence.
> RBs, 6C
Sevion Morrison will supply a pass-catching threat out of the backfield if he can stay healthy, and keep an
on Harry Stewart III, one of the standouts of spring practice who Leipold suggested could get a chance to play as a true freshman.
Wide receivers: The level of continuity KU has experienced at this position is almost unthinkable in modern college football, as its top two tiers of receivers — Lawrence Arnold, Luke Grimm and Quentin Skinner as the primary three targets, followed by Trevor Wilson and Doug Emilien as additional options — have remained almost completely intact since the 2022 season. (Several contributed in 2021 as well.)
None of these Jayhawks grab headlines, at least on a national level — though that’s not to say any one of the top three couldn’t put together a breakout season in 2024 — but they provide a foundation for the passing attack (ameliorating some of the uncertainty at tight end) and a familiar group for Daniels as he makes his return to action. In preparation for that return, position coach Terrence Samuel worked extensively with his charges on “scramble rules” — i.e., knowing where to go when a quarterback leaves the pocket. He also gave them the chance to sit in on quarterback meetings for a more complete understanding of the offense. The future of this group is a bit uncertain. Keaton Kubecka, a redshirt freshman, earned some playing time during his first campaign and could figure in further in 2024. Surahz Buncom and Tanaka Scott transferred in the offseason and Bryce Cohoon, a Maize native, joined from Syracuse.
Tight ends: Mason Fairchild was a threat for the Jayhawks and former offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki always seemed to find a way to scheme him open. With Fairchild gone, veteran Iowa State transfer and Topeka native DeShawn Hanika seemed poised to fill a similar role for Daniels and Grimes, until a leg injury in the spring cast his chances of playing in 2024 into doubt. KU recruited another project pass-catching tight end, Goodland native Leyton Cure, in the spring. Cure, a promising athlete and former high school quarterback who flashed potential in three years and one real season of action at Division II Fort Hays State, is just one piece of the puzzle. The favorite to assume something resembling Fairchild’s role is now the 6-foot-5, 255-pound Trevor Kardell, a fifth-year senior who has just 16 career catches. Jared Casey, who has a longtime connection with Daniels and a knack for coming through in big
moments (Texas in 2021 is the headliner, but consider his third-down reception at Iowa State last year), lacks a prototypical tight-end frame but will find ways to get involved.
Overall, though, Grimes, who oversees the tight ends, has assured them that no playing time is guaranteed. In his first tight end meeting, he said that everybody, “including you, Jared, including you, Trevor,” has to earn it.
Offensive line: This is one of the most intriguing position groups on the roster, particularly on the interior, and one that abruptly switched from shallow to deep when Texas A&M transfer center Bryce Foster, after weeks of speculation, committed to KU for both football and track and field in mid-June. Suddenly, the positionbattle storyline that dominated the spring — the question of whether returning guard Michael Ford Jr. or Tiffin transfer Shane Bumgardner would slide into the middle to play center, with
Ford possessing an apparent edge — took an abrupt left turn. Foster’s arrival meant that, if Foster could win the starting job, Ford could move back to guard, allowing longtime reserve Nolan Gorczyca and former Iowa State starter Darrell Simmons Jr. to settle back into rotational roles instead of battling for a starting spot opposite Kobe Baynes. (Michigan transfer Amir Herring also made his way to KU in the spring.)
Granted, Grimes has emphasized that (much like with the tight ends) nothing is assured, noted that Bumgardner had an excellent summer and mentioned that Foster could potentially also play guard. But with Foster’s SEC pedigree, history of quick adaptation and physical size, the most probable longterm group for the interior O-line is Ford, Foster and Baynes.
Bryce Cabeldue is back and will continue to lock down the right tackle position (having returned from a late-season injury),
but opposite him, KU has to replace Dominick Puni, who went to the San Francisco 49ers in the third round and became its highest-drafted player since 2008. Lawrence native Calvin Clements started the Guaranteed Rate Bowl and looked like he might have a chance to claim the spot, but onetime Wisconsin transfer Logan Brown is back from an injury of his own that kept him out in 2023 and is the favorite to start at left tackle. Clements, Gorczyca (who can play guard and tackle, but recently primarily tackle), James Livingston and Simmons figure to serve as key reserves. All are under a new position coach (though not new to Leipold), Daryl Agpalsa, who replaced Scott Fuchs in the offseason.
Defensive line: KU has an ongoing battle at weakside defensive end that consists almost entirely of newcomers and has dominated discourse about the Jayhawks’ defense ever since Austin Booker
declared for the NFL Draft following his lone season in Lawrence. He ended up a fifth-round selection by the Chicago Bears, making good on a one-year whirlwind that saw him arrive at KU with little fanfare and leave as the Big 12 defensive newcomer of the year. Perhaps the top contender to replace Booker at the pass-rush spot is Dean Miller, an athletic former JUCO transfer who has functioned primarily as a special teamer but worked his way into the defensive picture by inching his weight closer to the desired 240 pounds. (He was at 227 in early April and is now listed at 235.)
“The light went on that ‘In order to be able to play, I got to be bigger,’” Leipold said. “I said we didn’t bring him just to only run down on kickoffs. He’s embraced it, and it’s good to see, and he’s got a chance to really help us.”
Michigan State transfer Bai Jobe, who was the top player in Oklahoma coming out of high school in 2023, entered the picture in May, and similarly highly touted recruits Dakyus Brinkley and DJ Warner have a chance to become some of the first true freshmen to see extended playing time for Leipold and his longtime defensive coordinator Brian Borland. Of note, Jobe was hampered a bit by a hand injury in the early days of fall camp.
The strong-side spot has a chance to be one of the best on the entire defense, meanwhile, with returning starter Jereme Robinson growing into a team leader and joined by sixth-year senior Youngstown State transfer Dylan Wudke. However, Leipold said it was “hard to get a read on” Wudke in the spring as he dealt with a hamstring injury.
Charlie Riedel/AP File Photo
KANSAS TIGHT END TREVOR KARDELL (45) is chased by Duke defensive back Joshua Pickett (26) as he runs for a touchdown on Sept. 24, 2022, in Lawrence.
Another particularly deep position is defensive tackle, even after KU lost the steady Devin Phillips to graduation and Gage Keys to the transfer portal. That’s largely because of the breakout offseason of Caleb Taylor, another player who has had newfound success keeping on weight, starting around the midpoint of 2023. Robinson called him “unhuman” at Big 12 media days, Borland recently said that “The lightbulb went on” and Leipold called him “a very respected leader in a very quiet way.”
Taylor is joined by several other longtime returnees, including D.J. Withers, Tommy Dunn Jr. and Kenean Caldwell, all under the watchful eye of position coach Jim Panagos. North Dakota State transfer Javier Derritt is a new addition with pass-rush potential on the interior.
Linebackers: It’s a changing of the guard in the middle of the Jayhawk defense, as Rich Miller has exhausted his eligibility and been replaced by Cornell Wheeler.
Wheeler was actually one of KU’s best linebackers in a fairly small sample size last season, forcing some key turnovers, and he’ll now move into a leadership role as the Jayhawks’ top middle linebacker, as well as one of the first players on the team to take advantage of the newly legalized in-helmet communication. Position coach Chris Simpson has praised his natural feel for the game.
“Cornell will have some ability to be able to fix some things that ain’t exactly right,” Simpson said in the spring.
JB Brown and Taiwan Berryhill Jr. return as options at weak-side linebacker. While Berryhill missed some early action and struggled at times in 2023, Brown’s penchant for hard hitting was on full display throughout the year. His forced fumble against Oklahoma played a key role in the Jayhawks’ landmark upset. Leipold said he’s playing “fast and confident.”
“You can tell he’s really comfortable with what he’s supposed to be doing within our defense, and he keeps showing up,” he said.
The Hawk linebacker spot, a sort of linebackersafety hybrid that until this year was filled quite adeptly
by Craig Young (now with the Indianapolis Colts), has perhaps the most complex outlook of any position on the team. Borland recently laid it out as follows: When KU is in its 4-2-5 nickel package, the responsibility will fall to safeties Marvin Grant, Devin Dye or Jalen Dye; in base defense, linebackers like the previously rarely used Alex Raich or Young’s backup last year Jayson Gilliom will play. Simpson and Leipold had also mentioned redshirt freshman Logan Brantley as a prototypical Hawk option in the spring.
Cornerbacks: In Cobee Bryant and Mello Dotson, both preseason all-conference selections, KU has one of the league’s best secondaries and possibly one of the best top-two cornerback duos in the country, both entering their final season of college football. Enter D.K. McDonald, a new position coach and co-defensive coordinator who joins the
Jayhawks from the NFL ranks, having worked with players like Darius Slay on the Philadelphia Eagles. Both players, as well as other members of the defense, have credited him for his coaching style and his instructions on what they need to do to make it to the next level.
Bryant is outspoken and aggressive, while Dotson is more reserved; however, the latter made a name for himself with key defensive touchdowns late in 2023.
“I feel like they (are) going to be scared to try both of us now,” Bryant said. “I feel like since they didn’t target me last year, they tried Mello and Mello made them pay. So I feel like they don’t got no option but to run the ball.”
The depth beyond those two has dwindled in the offseason with the graduations of Kalon Gervin and Kwinton Lassiter, meaning onetime LSU transfer
Damarius McGhee, the man nicknamed “KSoo” who lost most of 2023 to injury, will have to step up. Behind him are players like Jameel Croft Jr., Brian Dilworth and a trio of highly touted new recruits in Jalen Todd, Aundre Gibson and Austin Alexander, with the early-enrolling Todd a particular standout. Safeties: Prolific tackler and defensive leader Kenny Logan Jr. exhausted his eligibility after years of extensive contributions to KU, but this remains one of the team’s deepest position groups. Grant and O.J. Burroughs have seen extensive time over the last two seasons with some success. Borland remarked at the start of fall camp that Burroughs had the best nose for the ball of anyone in the group, but also challenged him: “He can be one of our best fundamental tacklers that we have, but he was also some of the worst. He led our team in missed tackles last year and played
ABOVE: Kansas linebacker Cornell Wheeler (44) and Kansas defensive lineman Tommy Dunn Jr. (92) watch a Texas Tech field goal go wide during the fourth quarter on Nov. 11 at David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium.
LEFT: Kansas safety Marvin Grant defends against wide receiver Keaton Kubecka during practice on March 30 in Lawrence.
60% of the snaps.”
Borland, who oversees the safeties (but acknowledged he’s ceded a lot of that responsibility to McDonald), has typically only deployed three safeties in a given season. That could squeeze out one of the Dye brothers; Jalen impressed in the spring of 2023 and had a defensive touchdown in KU’s Spring Showcase this past offseason, while Devin has made his own case for playing time since arriving from Utah State as a winter transfer.
“This secondary can definitely be special,” Devin Dye said. “Everyone just holding each other accountable is a big thing that I feel like if we focus on and we do that, this group could be special.”
Mason Ellis is a key special teamer and one of the fastest players on the team.
Special teams: KU was less visibly deficient on special teams last season, but the expected improvement
with the addition of Sean Snyder to the coaching staff and Texas State transfer Seth Keller to the kicker group did not really materialize. KU finished a modest 60th in ESPN’s SP+ metric for special teams, and Keller was a respectable 11-for-14 on field goals, but his extremely limited range and his struggles clearing the line on extra-point attempts hamstrung the Jayhawks and helped cost them games against Oklahoma State and Kansas State.
KU tried to give biglegged backup Owen Piepergerdes some opportunities over the course of last season, which were largely unsuccessful. Snyder is gone to Oklahoma State (after initially appearing to leave coaching entirely), Keller has exhausted his eligibility, and Piepergerdes is now competing with Charlie Weinrich for this year’s placekicker spot, with Tabor Allen firmly ensconced as the kickoff specialist, though a competent field-goal kicker himself.
Damon Greaves is back for a second season as KU’s first-choice punter after averaging just 39.0 yards per kick as a freshman, albeit limiting opponents in the process; in fact, KU had what was statistically the nation’s best punt-return defense as it allowed just two returns for minus-6 yards. The return game will look somewhat different after the graduation of Logan, and reserve wide receiver Trevor Wilson, who returned a punt for a touchdown against UCF in 2023, could be the favorite to assume both kick- and puntreturn duties; however, he has struggled with fumbles that were, much like Keller’s poor point-afters, costly in two games last season.
Nick Krug/Journal-World File Photo
Carter Gaskins/Journal-World Photo
