Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Kansas Jayhawks Football Ranked + Takeaways From KU Downing BYU 38-27 in Big 12 Opener

Episode Date: September 26, 2023

Kansas Jayhawks football is now ranked 24th in the AP and Coaches' Poll after a 38-27 win against the BYU Cougars in their Big 12 opener and a 4-0 start. Short and long-term takeaways from the win, including if Cobee Bryant is on pace to be an All-American, KU's usage of Jalon Daniels in the running game, a top tier CFB running back duo with Devin Neal and Daniel Hishaw and more.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!NutrafolTake the first step to visibly thicker, healthier hair. For a limited time, Nutrafol is offering our listeners ten dollars off your first month’s subscription and free shipping when you go to Nutrafol.com/men and enter the promo code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE. DoorDashGet fifty percent off your first DoorDash order up to a twenty-dollar value when you use code lockedoncollege at checkout. Limited time offer, terms apply.Jase MedicalSave more than $360 by getting these lifesaving antibiotics with Jase Medical plus an additional $20 off by using code LOCKEDON at checkout on jasemedical.com.Athletic BrewingGo to AthleticBrewing.com and enter code LOCKEDON to get 15% off your first online order or find a store near you! Athletic Brewing. Milford, CT and San Diego, CA. Near Beer.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE for $20 off your first purchase.LinkedInLinkedIn Jobs helps you find the qualified candidates you want to talk to, faster. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com/LOCKEDONCOLLEGE. Terms and conditions apply.FanDuelMake Every Moment More. Right now, NEW customers can bet FIVE DOLLARS and get TWO HUNDRED in BONUS BETS – GUARANTEED. Visit FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON to get started.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's Locked on Jayhawks short and long-term takeaways from KU's win over BYU, the Jayhawks are ranked now. Run defense looked good. What are some of the long-term takeaways we can have from the 38-27 win? That on today's edition of the show. You are Locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks. Part of the Locked On Podcast Network. Your team every day.

Johnson, you can hear me as well. Monday through Friday from 3 to 6 p.m. on KLWN in Lawrence with Rock Chalk Sports Talk. Thanks for making Locked On Jayhawks your first listen every day. We are free and available wherever you get any of your podcasts. You can like and subscribe to the show on our YouTube page. On today's edition of the show, we're talking short and long-term takeaways from KU's win over BYU. We'll get more into the KU-Texas game.

First, this episode of the show is brought to you by GameTime. Download the GameTime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE for $20 off your first purchase with GameTime. So, first short-term takeaway here, KU's ranked now. They're 24th in the coaches poll. They're 24th in the AP poll, which is the one that I truly care about. So, that's cool. Kansas being ranked, that's a positive. I mean, it's not something that we see every day. So that's cool. You know, Kansas being ranked, that's a positive. I mean, it's not something that we see every day, every year for Kansas.

They were ranked twice last week or two weeks last week, I guess I should say it was after they started five and oh, they were ranked, I think 19th and then they lost the TCU and they were still ranked 19th. So it'll be interesting to see if they end up ranked more or less than, than last year, because obviously this week is going to be tough. You're playing Texas. If you lose the Texas, do you drop out of the rankings or if you play Texas close,

do you stay in the rankings at maybe 24 or 25? Will there be other opportunities, right? If you lose Texas, but beat UCF the next week, do you get ranked again? If you gave me the over under of, will they have same less or more ranked opportunities this year than, than last year? I think at this point you probably ranked again. If you gave me the over-under of will they have same, less, or more ranked opportunities this year than last year, I think at this point you probably take over. You just need two more weeks. I think that's entirely possible, though the schedule does get very difficult from here. Another short-term takeaway, run defense is key to this team doing well,

and boy did it show up for Kansas. That was something I kind of thought all offseason long. Yeah, it's not the be-all, end-all. It's not everything, but keep in mind, even though you have over 300 yards passing, and I kind of talked about that, I did think, you know, it wasn't your best passing defense game. I do think it wasn't like a horrible game either that some people were making it out to be. But run defense is kind of the key to things going well for KU on that end, getting into down and distances that you are going to like and be favorable and disallowing the opponent from just moving up and down the field and just possessing the ball forever.

So run defense was good against BYU. They ended up with very few rushing yards. I think if you look at just the rushing yards, if you take out the sacks, the non-sack rushing yards, it was still only like 30 yards. It was a very, very low number. Kansas was dominant on the defensive line and stopping the run, and that's what you want to see moving forward. Now, we saw a lot of good games last year where they stopped the run,

didn't always transfer over to each and every game. And so far this year has been so good. That's why I have it as a short-term takeaway, though. I think this week will be probably a better test for the long-term takeaway in terms of the run defense. As I mentioned with the pass defense in the short term here, I, it wasn't bad. I don't think it was great, but you give a seven yards per attempt. That would rank 52nd in the country in terms of, you know, offenses.

If you averaged seven yards per attempt or what you're doing as a defense, you would be a ranked 52nd in the country defensively and what you're giving up to the opposing offense. So it's not like it was that bad of a game. And on top of that, you also ended up with two interceptions. You basically played a style that was, yeah, we had close coverage. They were just going to have to make the well-accurate thrown ball and have to make a slightly contested catch. And a lot of times they did, and you give them credit for that, but you didn't give up a lot of yards after catch. There weren't a bunch of guys just running around wide open. They had good in rhythm plays plays Keaton Slovis outside of the interceptions played a good game some of the

receivers Isaac Rex Chase Roberts Darius Lassner like they played pretty good games but uh Kansas was able to hit the big mistakes when they needed to which basically if you're going to play that way you have to take advantage of the mistakes when they're given because you're basically expecting them to pounce on it and I thought thought – I heard this stat the other day on the Athletic Fantasy Football show for – or not Fantasy Football, the Athletic NFL, like, football podcast. And they were talking about in the NFL, like, the league average – and this was, like, last week, so far in the season – is 17%, something around that number, in terms of passes that are just missed by the quarterbacks.

So, like, you're going to have, like, incompletions where it's the defensive back makes a great play on the ball or the receiver drops the pass. But sometimes I think we get too caught up in the idea of like when you're watching the game, like, oh, if only they, you know, they did this or they're actually better than that team because they just made a stupid mistake. But we don't take into account that making stupid mistakes, sometimes that is the difference of why this team is better than the other. It's just that one team makes stupid mistakes more often. That is part of the game.

As much as it is winning the game, it's not losing the game, right? You hear that kind of cliche from coaches, but it's true. So basically, you're going to have mistakes from the opposition. They're going to be throws that they just straight up miss and you have to take advantage of when that is the case. Other short-term takeaways, putting up 38 points with 55 plays on offense. That's kind of insane for what Katie was able to do. You look at the total yards and then the jumps off the page,

like mid 300 yards, like you had like 150 passing yards, but 38 points, 55 plays plays and obviously a couple of those aided by defensive touchdowns that also hurt some of your total yards is a very efficient game for KU football uh the talented linebacker depth arrived in this game is another short-term takeaway Taiwan Berryhill was injured and you played a lot of snaps for you know the usual suspects with Rich Miller and Craig Young J.B. Brown saw his biggest snap total game. Then you had Cornell Wheeler play his biggest snap total game, and he made some really good, impactful plays for you.

I was really impressed with what he brought out there. You're seeing more of the linebacker depth this year than you have in any of the previous, I don't know, three, four, maybe five years. You probably have to go back to Joe Dineen. But even then, when you had Joe Dineen or Drew Prox or Ben Heaney, it's not that KU had an insane amount of linebacker depth. They just had one good linebacker, one really good player.

So linebacker depth is really starting to show up early in this year and did in that game. One short-term takeaway I might have here, is Austin Booker KU's best pass rusher or pure pass rusher? I don't know. Maybe that's more of a long-term takeaway. But certainly, I think through four games, you can make that argument. Jeremy Robinson's been good. You've seen flashes from other guys, but Austin Booker just has another level and another get off

to him. Can I interest any, anybody in the transitive property from a short-term takeaway here? We talked a bit about that, you know, Kansas obviously beat Illinois and Penn State beat Illinois the next week. Now, different Illinois and Penn State beat Illinois the next week now different situations Penn State was at Illinois Illinois was at Kansas also Penn State beat Illinois by a decent amount more points than Kansas did though if Kansas would have finished the game strong like they were up 31 to 7 then they would have actually ended up winning more than Penn State did but you looked at the yardage totals and Penn State only out yarded Illinois by like 20, 30 yards. Kansas almost doubled up the yards of Illinois. They had almost

more rushing yards did Kansas than Illinois had total yards. So you could make the argument they're off transitive property. Penn State just dominated Iowa that Kansas, you know, was favorable to Illinois than Penn State was. Well, how about the most recent transitive property one? And we know transitive property isn't always the greatest way to judge a team or to figure this out because we see all the time this team beats that team, that team beats somebody else, and then that team beats, you know, you just get kind of a weird chain of, you know, four different teams beating each other who all beat the other one

or three different teams or whatever it is. That's not the greatest way. Styles make fights and, you know, there are different games every single day, but sometimes you can use it to compare a little bit, especially over the long haul. Well, Kansas obviously beat BYU this past weekend. They beat them by 11 points. BYU won at Arkansas the weekend before by seven points. Arkansas nearly won at LSU. LSU kicked the last second field goal to beat Arkansas. LSU is a top 15 team. So again, you could make the transitive property situation that Kansas win over BYU by 11 means,

and BYU won at Arkansas by seven. I guess that means that you're, I don't know, 18 points better than Arkansas, only lost LSU by three. You're 15 points better than LSU, a top 15 team. Kansas put them in the top 10 because of that. Obviously, again, I know that's not how it works. And, you know, if LSU is playing Kansas on a neutral field, LSU is going to be favored by probably a couple touchdowns.

But I think that speaks kindly and well about your team and where you are based on some of those other results. You know, it's not the be all end all, but it means something at the very least. All right, let's get on to our long-term takeaways here with Locked on Jayhawks. First though, this episode of the show is brought to you by GameTime. Have you ever been stressed out

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We will have a KU small forward position preview later this week. Nick Schwartz is going to join us later this week. We'll also have a KU Texas preview later on this week, so make sure you're subscribed to the show. Well, long-term, I think you look at it, and through four games so far, Kansas has now handled two Power 5 teams that could be six or seven win teams. At this point with Illinois, I think they're two and two. They beat a good Toledo team, had kind of a close win this past weekend. Two losses are

to Kansas and Penn State. It remains to be seen. Could Illinois be a five-win team? Could they be a six or seven-win team? Sure. Wouldn't surprise you anywhere in that range. BYU. If BYU would have beat Kansas, maybe they would have been looked at as, they'd probably be ranked, maybe they'd be looked at as an eight or nine- team. Honestly, would it shock you if, if, with how some of the teams in the big 12 are down, I don't know BYU's full schedule. If BYU still got to eight wins? No, not necessarily. But I think realistically BYU probably six or seven win team. And so, you know, on its own beating two, six or seven win power five teams is not something that's going to boost your

resume to get you ranked in the top 10 in the college football playoff rankings or put you in playoff contention. No, but what it means is that Kansas didn't just win both those games. They handled both games. They won both games by double figures. They dominated the second half against BYU. They dominated the first half against Illinois. To me, that clearly shows that you were on another level. If you have now consistently, over two games, beaten Power 5 opponents who could win six or seven games and look to be the better team, pretty clearly in both games, maybe not blowouts, but seemingly clearly you were the better team,

doesn't that tell you that you're on another level from where those teams were? And where is that level? I don't know. Does that mean instead of a six or seven win team like those teams could be you're a eight win team does it mean you're a nine or ten win team does it mean you're a big 12 title contender i don't know at the very least though you start with the floor and say okay that probably means we should be on par with an eight win team and lance light bulb said it today at a press conference or a monday this is coming out on tuesday that uh, you know, this next, uh, like court or a third of games, you know, they, they had the first four where they went for now last year, therefore, no,

but it was that next four that will determine this year, how much better they are as a program this year than last year. Because if you fall off a bit and you're five and three, uh, after these next four games, just like you were last year, then you're going to feel like it's, you know, pretty parallel. Right. So right? So it'll be determined more in these next four than anything you did in the first four, most likely, but you had to get out of those first four. Well, and what they've shown so far makes me believe long-term this is an eight or more win team. Jalen Daniels ran the ball, nine carries, 54 yards. Obviously, it wasn't a game where he had 15 or 20 carries. And I think that's kind of beyond us. Maybe

in a do or die game, like in a game where you're playing a ranked opponent or you're playing like for a bowl game or a championship or something, all this stuff goes out the window because that is kind of do-or-die mode. But I think this is going to be kind of the sweet spot for Jalen Daniels running the ball in these games moving forward, around 8 to 12 carries. You know, last year there were games where the numbers were getting basically double that. So 9 carries for 54. I think you see that. he did take a couple hits, did run a few times. It was more than the Nevada game. The Nevada game, you didn't get a ton of runs, a ton

of design runs for Jalen or keepers by him. There were a lot more in this game. And I think what that tells you is this, over the course of this season, he's going to be more limited running than he was last year because they're going to try to protect his health. And I think that's a smart thing to do. But also they're going to pick and choose their moments. They're not going to completely delete it from the playbook. They're going to still allow them to do it. It'll just be less than last year, but still enough that defenses have to worry about it. And I think that's kind of the good balance that you're looking for. My other long-term takeaway I have here, when Daniel Hyshaw holds onto the football and doesn't fumble, this running back duo of Daniel Hyshaw and Devin Neal,

it is as good as any running back duo in the country. Like seriously. Devin Neal is an NFL running back. Daniel Hyshaw, I think, is an NFL running back if he can hold on to the football. And Devin Neal, I think, will be in the NFL maybe as soon as next year. Hyshaw might take a couple years, right? Maybe Devin Neal goes pro after this year. Hyshaw becomes the feature back after next year.

If you can hold on to the football, that is a big if because that has been a struggle for him. You see the power, you see the speed, you see the talent, you see the athleticism. This kid's unbelievable. He would be a really good starting power five running back for a lot, a lot of other programs in the country. You just happen to have two of them and both of them are really good. Devin Neal might be on way to all-conference first team. Who knows? Maybe he'll sneak into an all-American team. If Daniel Hyshaw was the running back, you know,

getting all the carries instead of Devin Neal, I feel like he could do that too, and you got two of them. So I think this is one of the best duos in the country. Speaking of kind of all-American and awards, one long-term takeaway I think you can have from this game and maybe the first four games, has Kobe Bryant taken the step from all-Big 12 first team, which he was last year, to being an All-American? I think you can make that case so far. He has an 82 grade on Pro

Football Focus, including a 78 grade in coverage. Both of those are excellent grades. On the season, he has been targeted nine times now this year. He has only given up 28 yards. So on average, every time he's targeted, he's only given up three yards, which is stupendous, especially when you take into account that he also has two interceptions. So basically, if you extrapolated those numbers out, obviously this isn't how it works, but basically you said, like this is to give you an example of how good those numbers are for Kobe Bryant. Nine targets, giving up 28 yards and two interceptions. If that were a quarterback's numbers, and you extrapolated that out to a quarterback throwing the ball, I don't know, 36 times in a game. Like that's an above average number, you know, not anything too crazy.

A quarterback threw the ball 36 times in a game. On average, if Kobe Bryant was in coverage, that means the quarterback on 36 throws would only have on pace for 112 yards with eight interceptions. Kobe Bryant's playing like an All-American right now. Also showed that he can hit. Also showed that he can stop the run. And if he keeps playing like he is right now, he should be an All-American. Will he get enough hype? That'll be dependent on how much, you know, interceptions he gets and how many interceptions he gets and how much Kansas remains in the public scene and ranked and on some of these primetime games. But through four weeks for me, I think he should be an All-American.

All right, let's finish up more of a look on the Texas Longhorns, KU football's next opponent upcoming this Saturday. First, this episode of the show is brought to you by DoorDash. Love the convenience of getting what you want right to your door? With DoorDash grocery delivery, you can stock up on the week or order last-minute cravings conveniently. You might be watching the KU Texas game. It's going to be on during 2.30, so it's kind of right between that time

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download the DoorDash app in the App Store and enter code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE. Don't forget, that's code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE for 50% off your first order with DoorDash. So what is next for KU? They're taking on Texas, 2.30 Central Time. The game will be on ABC, primetime game, down in Austin. This will be the final meeting between the two schools before Texas goes to the SEC. Who knows what will happen between non-COVID scheduling

or bowl games. Obviously, there's not super bad blood between Kansas and Texas, like when Missouri left, for instance. But also, I don't think Texas is going to be chomping at the bit on their scheduling to schedule Kansas necessarily. So who knows when the next time these two schools will meet. But the fact it's in Austin when your famous win, obviously there were a lot of memes and funny laughs

and Texas winning in 2016 in Lawrence. But the game that was in Austin two years ago where you win against when that was a Kansas team in the first year of Lance Leipold, and I think that was in Austin two years ago where you win against – when that was a Kansas team in the first year of Lance Leipold, and I think that was the first year of Steve Sarkeesian, and you have Jared Casey making the two-point conversion. That was such a big deal, I think, for the movement of this program, for the belief in this program and what the coaching staff was doing for KU.

But also it was a big moment from a negative perspective against Texas. And I think you saw them play with an extra chip on their shoulder when they came into Lawrence last year because of it. Dominated the game, 55-14. They dominated the running game. They ran for over 400 yards against you. And now Kansas gets to go into this one with a little bit of chip on their shoulder because they're like, we saw what you did against us last year.

Let's buckle up. But I think Texas is past at this point overlooking Kansas. One, there's a ranking next to them. Two, you saw it last year. And three, the 2021 version was kind of an awakening for them. Texas is being opened. It books anywhere between 17 to 20-point favorite. That feels like too many points to me.

I think Kansas can keep it close. I'm not picking Kansas to win the game. Can I see them losing by 10 to 14? You know how I could see this one going, and maybe this is a bad reason for me to say pick the spread because I think they ended up losing this one by 21. Could be wrong with that. It was the 2008 season, so it was the year after Kansas just won the Orange Bowl.

They won 07 season, but the Orange Bowl wasn't 08. So it was the 08 season. They were playing Oklahoma, and that was the Oklahoma team with Sam Bradford that eventually played in the national title and lost to Florida. And Kansas, they never really got blown out. Desmond Briscoe had over 200 yards. They couldn't really stop Desmond Briscoe, but they ended up losing by three scores because they couldn't stop Oklahoma. And I'm not saying it's directly that way. It's just that I view this game in kind of the same light. I could see Kansas hanging around, never really having a chance to maybe

fully winning the game, but also never being blown out out I could see that being the case I do think it'll be closer than that one and I could see Kansas kind of hanging enough to make it interesting toward the end but if Kansas loses by seven or ten points obviously this is not what you're telling if you're Lance Lightwell you're not hey guys let's only win by nine points today you know no but from the outside from my perspective if they do end up losing the game by 10, 11 points, by seven points, you're competitive. Obviously, you want to win the game, but that would still be taken as a good number

to where you would feel like, okay, maybe we can be big 12 title contenders. We hung around with what's expected to be the best team in the conference, a top five team on the road in addition to everything. So we'll see how this week goes, but certainly it'll be a tough matchup. Texas is athletes, strong players all around the board,

and this will be KU's biggest test of the regular season. I think they're ready for it, and I think it'll be a very fun game on Saturday. We'll have a further preview of the game coming up later this week. We've got our small forward preview. Nick Schwert will join us later in the week too. You've been listening to Locked on Jayhawks.

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