Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Kansas Jayhawks Recaps: Football Run Over by Texas, Basketball Escapes Southern Utah behind Jalen Wilson

Episode Date: November 21, 2022

Recapping the Kansas Jayhawks football loss to Texas after the Longhorns and Bijan Robinson ran all over Lance Leipold's defense. Jalon Daniels returned for KU but it wasn't enough. GOATs of the week featuring Quentin Skinner. Plus, a KU Basketball recap in Norm Roberts' final game as head coach before the return of Bill Self as the Jayhawks narrowly escape Southern Utah behind Jalen Wilson's 33 points and Gradey Dick's big shot.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!LinkedInLinkedIn jobs helps you find the candidates you want to talk to, faster. Post your job for free at Linkedin.com/lockedoncollege Terms and conditions apply.Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKEDON15,” and you’ll get 15% off your next order.BetOnlineBetOnline.net has you covered this season with more props, odds and lines than ever before. BetOnline – Where The Game Starts!Underdog FantasySign up on underdogfantasy.com with the promo code LOCKED ON and get your first deposit doubled up to $100!SimpliSafeWith Fast Protect™️ Technology, exclusively from SimpliSafe, 24/7 monitoring agents capture evidence to accurately verify a threat for faster police response. There’s No Safe Like SimpliSafe. Visit SimpliSafe.com/LockedOnCollege to learn more.UpsideDownload the FREE Upside App at https://upside.app.link/locked to get $5 or more cash back on your first purchase of $10 or more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's Locked on Jayhawks, we go over the Kansas loss to the Texas Longhorns and also a little recap of KU basketball's win over Southern Utah. You are Locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks, part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. I'm Derek Johnson. Thanks for making Locked on Jayhawks your first listen every day. We are free and available wherever you get your podcasts. You can also subscribe to us and find us on YouTube. You can also find me three to six Monday through Friday on Rock Chalk Sports Talk on KLWN in Lawrence. And on today's edition of Locked on Jayhawks, we recap the KU blowout loss to Texas. We recap the KU tight win over Southern Utah in basketball.

Let's start off with the football side of things. KU never really in the game against Texas. I guess there was a brief moment in time where it felt like, hey, maybe they had a shot. They forced Texas to punt on the first drive. They almost hit the deep ball to Quentin Skinner. Also, when it was, I believe, 17-0 or 14-0, when KU had the touchdown to Jared Casey

that ended up being reversed for kind of a bad call of an ineligible man downfield, and then you missed the field goal, that would have made it 17-7 with the touchdown, 17-3 with the field goal. You give up the late touchdown at the end of the half where even if it was 24-0, still kind of felt like you were out of it

with the way you couldn't stop the run. But the way you give up that last second touchdown after they just run all over you down the field as they did really all game long, at least you had in the back of your mind if it was 24-0, hey, we were down 28-3 to Baylor at half. That's even bigger than we'd be down here, and we came back and made it a game, and it was a one-score game late in the back of your mind if it was 24 nothing hey we were down 28 to 3 to Baylor at half that's even bigger than we'd be down here and we came back and made it a game and it was a one

score game late in the fourth quarter with the Texas game they got that touch and so from there didn't really ever feel like KU had a shot in this game and it's because they ran all over you they ran for over 400 rushing yards that continues to be a negative trend for this defense of having bad games against the run whether it was last year or this season. The first five games this season looked like the run defense might have been solved. They were good against Oklahoma State as well, but the other games it has been kind of a mess, and that was the crown jewel of the run defense games

in a negative light for the KU defense against Texas. Certainly the weather being cold, you thought may have been actually a good thing for Kansas. I think it certainly impacted some of the passing game with Quinn Ewers and Jalen Daniels a bit. But even though Quinn Ewers didn't really have a big game, he did hit a couple big passes, even though he wasn't called upon very often. It just didn't matter because Texas dominated on the line of scrimmage on, I would say probably a little bit of both ends, more so on the line of scrimmage on, I would say, probably a little bit of both ends, more so on the offensive line against KU's defensive line, who struggled to get push. Kansas only had two tackles for loss in the game, didn't get any sacks.

Obviously, there weren't a ton of throwing opportunities to get sacks in the game. And Bijan Robinson looked like the absolute stud, All-American, All-Conference player, first-round pick, whatever tag you want to give him running all up against your defense. It was certainly a disappointing effort for Kansas. You're talking about senior day, and I didn't think it was a great crowd attending for KU. It wasn't a bad crowd. I mean, if you would have put that crowd for any game last year, you would have been like, wow, what a turnout for Kansas.

So from that standpoint, it was a positive. But if you compare it to like the sellouts, it wasn't a great crowd. It wasn't super loud. And obviously Kansas didn't give them a lot of reasons early in the game to be super loud along the way. But certainly when you have a coach who has been brought up in all these different job rumors for Nebraska and Wisconsin and whatnot, for you not to sell out and show out on senior day probably not great overall but again Kansas performance didn't really warrant one that uh you know can you believe there wasn't as much fan support and all that stuff right uh you were never really in the game as I mentioned it was cold weather and all that stuff and um just by far the the worst performance of the season for

Kansas every other game they had been at least at least some resemblance of competitive in. You could say the Oklahoma game, yeah, it ended as a 10-point game, but that game never really felt like Kansas was in it. But at least they kept it. They hung around, I guess, so to speak. You never even hung around in this game. You never had that moment where you went on a big run to maybe make things

a little bit interesting there. And for that standpoint, it is one of the more disappointing losses of the short Lance light bulb tenure, but guess what? That's almost like, I don't want to say, Oh, it's a good thing that they lost, you know, by 40 points to Texas, but to the standpoint of now that we're at a point where, you know, it's a big deal and it's, it feels very disappointing for KU to get blown out. It's no longer apathy, right? That was the, you know, it's a big deal and it's, it feels very disappointing for KU to get blown out. It's no longer apathy, right? That was the, the problem, the hurdle that was approaching past Kansas teams. It was apathy. It was, I don't care, whatever. I'm just going to leave. I'm done with this. Like, I'm not going to pay attention to this. Let me know when something changes.

Now the reaction to this is, oh, what's going on? What's wrong? Why didn't they adjust to this? Why did this or that happen? Like, that sucks. I hated that. That was annoying. All that stuff. It's no longer apathy, which is a good thing that you have that now, even though, like I said, the result itself was not a good thing.

But the trend that the program is going on certainly is a good thing. And it ended the streak of, I mentioned this last week with texas tech every opponent you had played this year that you played last year you played better this season except for tcu which again tcu is a lot better this year than they were last year blah blah i've said that so many times um that obviously did not happen to texas who you beat by a point last year and now you got blown out this season i would imagine by the way for texas hearing about i know i mentioned this in the week leading up, hearing all the jokes about Kansas beating you and whatnot for a year for a very talented football team.

And they had to win out their final two games to have a chance at the big 12 title game. And they just lost the TCU. Yeah, that's kind of a pissed off football team. And that's not always fun to play when they have all that talent in the world. But this does happen, right? Even to teams who are middling football teams, which is kind of where Kansas is. Like Kansas is a middle of the Big 12 type of team.

And that's not meant as like a negative. That's honestly a positive from where KU has been. Be a middle of the pack team because that means you're going to bowl games. That means you're winning six plus games in a season, right? But for those types of teams, there's a reason those types of teams win five six seven games because they're imperfect because they have ups and downs throughout the season right that's

the big difference and you look across the big 12 like other teams that are bowl eligible who have five six seven wins along the way this season have gone through one or two of those results that kansas just had and again it's not me excusing or saying that it's okay or that you shouldn't strive to do better than that or avoid that because you absolutely should strive to do better than that. It was disappointing that it happened. But I guess what I'm saying is reality check, this does happen, especially for a team that just was 2-10 and has worked their way to bowl eligibility.

And even for teams, Oklahoma State, who was ranked in the latest college football playoff rankings and you know bowl eligible themselves that's a team that lost by a billion points to Kansas State Baylor lost by like 30 points to Kansas State uh West Virginia who won't be bowl eligible anymore but that's a four-win team who could become a five-win team hypothetically if they were to win their last game like they got blown out by Baylor. Oklahoma got housed by TCU. Like you go down the list, all these teams who are kind of in the middle pack of the big 12, they have one or two games where they were blown out by somebody else.

And that was KU's first of the season. So again, it's not something that you strive for and just completely excuse and say, yeah, it happens. And from a coaching standpoint, obviously you don't. But for me sitting here and evaluating where the program's at, that's kind of what I'm doing. Like it happens to some of these teams. You just hope it doesn't happen successively against your rival next week

against Kansas State. Certainly the quarterback, I don't know, conversation is interesting with KU, Jalen Daniels. The stats look pretty good at the end of things, but certainly he didn't look the same, wasn't able to run as much. We saw Jason being late. Clearly he was, you know, nursing sort of injuries over the course of the week and practice and whatnot is what Lance Leipold said in the postgame afterwards.

And KU kind of had to deal with that. And Texas is a very talented team, and you played a bad game, and you didn't adjust well enough. You didn't play enough. Like, there's no excuses I can have. But also at the end of the day, if we're doing big picture stuff, Kansas is still bowl eligible. You still have an opportunity this week to try to beat your rival for the first time in a while, although that looks, I don't know,

quite tough to say the least after the way that Texas just ran all up and down you. But the struggles to the quarterback position being injured just changed things so much too in what Kansas can do and running the triple option game and running the quarterback. And I just wonder if we won't see that again until the bowl game or maybe next year. Maybe the bowl game gives you enough time off in between

that we see Jalen daniels get back to full health because uh whether it was his decision or coaching decision not to have him run as much like certainly that was uh a key component of the game that ku wasn't able to do this this go around but in the end disappointing result one of the more disappointing ones we we've seen over the past couple years and certainly this season but at the end of the day, big picture, things are going to be okay. All right. This episode of Locked on Jayhawks is brought to you by SimpliSafe. Did you know that over the holidays, property crimes like burglaries and package thefts

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How about Quentin Skinner? I thought he played a really good game, had four catches. The first one would have been such a tough grab because you're diving full out for it. And if that ball is a foot less, it's a much much easier catch it was still a pretty good throw by jaylen um but by diving to get to the ball which he had to do that makes you land on it and it makes it really hard to hold on because then the ball kind of squirts out and it becomes more difficult there but he was really good uh again showed the connection with jaylen we saw him get open on another deep ball in the second half that jaylen hit him on. He had a couple tight window throws, one over the middle of the field, another

kind of on the outside. Quentin Skinner was really good, and it was nice to see that on the outside for the big receiver for Kansas. I have, I don't know, this is basically just an excuse for me to talk about Jalen Daniels, but I will say some Jalen daniels flashes are in good goat of the week the entire performance does not there was the first throw of the game that very easily could have been a pick or a pick six if not for the inclement weather that made it difficult to like the ball in those conditions when it's that cold and when it's a drier day and there's wind and stuff it becomes very slick and that's what led to the first play not being an interception so So I do wonder, because you didn't just see Jalen Daniels struggle. You also saw Quinn Ewers, the quarterback for Texas, struggle.

How much that had an impact on the passing game. I do think that was a part of it. But certainly with Jalen, we did see some flashes. The throw over the middle to Quentin Skinner in between tight coverage, he zipped that one. There was also one on the sideline to Quentin Skinner, as previously mentioned, that he zipped that one through as well um so you did see some flashes you saw those two deep balls the first that was incomplete to skinner um was still pretty good throw and then the next

one to skinner downfield in the second half like you saw some flashes of the jalen of old in the live arm we'll get to the bad goat part i guess I'll just do it right now in conjunction, but there certainly were some bad parts about it as well, though. Overall, for the majority of the game, you didn't see as much zip on the arm. You didn't see as much power on some of the throws, which is a little bit worrisome, but it could just be him shaking off the rust, and maybe we see it against Kansas State look 100%. Maybe we don't. i would think by the

bowl game if it's not by the bowl game that might be a little bit alarming there um but i i don't know for sure with with that injury and what he's dealing with and whatnot uh but i mean overall statistically good jaylen daniels game as far as the impact some of the struggles early on it was just kind of a mad game it wasn't like a a bad game and very easily could have had even better stats, right? If the Jared Casey touchdown doesn't get called off. Now he has three touchdowns, one interception. He's looking at, I don't know, around 240 yards, something like that. And the stats would probably look a lot better.

I will say that, like, I don't know that I want to totally give it to the pass blocking because there were some times that Jalen Daniels had to use his mobility to get away from pressure. I'll just say like pass blocking ish slash Daniels mobility on passes, basically KU's avoidance of sacks. I did think the pass blocking was pretty solid for KU. There were a few times, like I said, where either Texas blitzed or where they maybe did get a little bit of a pass rush. And then Daniels was able to use that mobility to kind of skate by. But overall, no sacks allowed to the team who came in first in the big 12 in sacks on the defensive end that's all I got for good goats this week it uh was not a ton of them for Kansas let's get to the bad I guess we can start with the quarterback stuff um as I mentioned it wasn't all great from

Jalen he had uh the interception that was bad with with ku kind of going into the end zone he had the the first one that very easily could have been an interception uh but beyond that i think the lack of quarterback running game and maybe you would just tie this in and say the the bad goat here is qb health because jason being did come in late but he was battling injuries all week long in practice, and so K didn't have a ton of faith there. With Jalen, clearly it was affecting some of his throws in terms of maybe not being as hard and maybe some of the fundamentals or his throwing motion was a little bit different and may have altered some passes and made some passes more inaccurate than we're used to.

Like there was a little out route a few yards downfield that he missed on the second or third drive of the game. Uh, he threw a couple over the middle that just kind of sailed on him or missed short. So, um, clearly that was an issue, but the lack of QB running game was, was prime in that. And I don't know if that was Jalen just trying not to take hits. I don't know if that was the coaches trying not to set him up for hits. I don't know if it was, you know, forget the read option and the triple option game. We're just going to have design runs. Like these are going to be designed gives that we're going to give off. But Kansas is such a different offense when they have the quarterback runs

involved in the offense. It just, it completely changes how a defense has to go about kind of defending things on the other end. And KU didn't really have that in this game against Texas, probably because of the QB health I will say like plenty of credit for Jalen Daniels for gritting it out and again overall like statistically it was a good game for him but certainly there were some things that were lacking from the earlier guy we saw this season that was a Heisman candidate the biggest bad goat just the defense in general back-to-back weeks

here you give up over 50 points to Texas. More than anything, though, you give up over 400 yards on the ground. You never had a chance at winning this game with the way that you were defending the rushing game. You just couldn't do anything against them. B. John Robinson ran all over you. Their offensive line was getting easy push on your defensive line. They were getting up to the second level. KU was missing tackles. They were taking bad angles.

B. John Robinson was just able to cut all around the field juke by guys it was uh an impressive performance by him in the Texas offense but certainly not one to be proud of for the KU defense on that end they did have a couple um throws downfield that they gave up that I think maybe prevented Brian Borland from going hey let's just stick eight guys in the box and we'll leave guys on the Island on the outside consistently like they did do it sometimes. And then Texas kind of hit them. Sometimes we saw the screen game come in play. And, and again, Kansas inability to on like third down and long, or I would even go above

that on basically plays where you have a lot of yards to give up and they just give them all up like the third down and goal I think from like the 15 they get a touchdown on a receiver screen like that cannot happen after it had just happened against Baylor a couple weeks ago at the end of the first half Texas had the ball at what the Kansas 25 yard line with 10 seconds left and they ran the ball to be John Robinson for a play to get to the one that allowed them to go for it on the final play of the half and score a touchdown.

Those things cannot happen, especially on simple plays just like that, but they have consistently happened to Kansas really these last two weeks and a lot over the course of this season. Bad goat, inability to finish drives. You had a couple drives that resulted in no points, that you moved the ball well. Part of that is the field goal kicking, which we saw a new kicker in there, which was certainly interesting on the PATs. Jacob Borchella continues to really struggle as a field goal kicker for ku

uh the refs deserve a bad goat obviously it didn't impact the game texas was winning that one way or another but maybe it could have been the difference in kansas you know feeling a little bit better about themselves having a more competitive game with that call there the one that bijan robinson just straight up pushes uh I think it was Mello Dotson from behind. Like, if Mello Dotson does that to a receiver, it's the easiest pass interference call in the world. But they never call it with offensive PI. That one seemed very obvious.

How did they not call it? So some things that, you know, didn't go KU's way, but at the end of the day didn't impact the result at all. Did I mention the defense for bad goats for KU in this one? Because that would certainly be up there. All right. In a moment, we are going to recap the Kansas Southern Utah game from Friday night on the basketball court. Kansas

escaping from the Thunderbirds. But first, this episode of Locked on Jayhawk is brought to you by Nissan. And this week's thrilling moment in college football brought to you by Nissan. The thrilling designs behind the new lineup from nissan are intended to empower drivers and vehicles as capable as the drivers themselves when i think of

unbelievable abilities on the field for this week's thrilling moment and not as many to choose from this week i i want to pick the jared casey one even though it didn't count can i just pick that one i'm going to whatever kansas lost by like 40 points because for that brief moment of time before the late flag came in and they called it against KU, even though the ineligible man downfield was only two yards down the line of scrimmage instead of what he's allowed to be, which I believe is three. So it should have been a legal play. That was an awesome play. Jalen rolling left.

There's vintage. Jalen throws it on the run, hits Jared Casey. He dives in for the pie line. You're like, oh, Texas is having Jared Casey PTSD. I know it didn't count, but that brief moment in time when it felt like it did, and it felt like, hey, Kansas is back in the game. It's 17-6.

A couple years ago, we saw him come back from 17-0 against Texas Tech here. Like, they're back in this, and then it dissipated. But for that brief moment in time, it was a very exciting moment. This segment has been inspired by the thrilling new designs featured across Nissan's new lineup of vehicles. Pursue what thrills you in the all-new Frontier, Armada,

or Pathfinder today, available now at nissanusa.com. Okay, finishing things up with some KU basketball takeaways, recap from the Southern Utah game. Certainly Kansas pushed further than you thought they would. Southern Utah is a team that can definitely give opponents challenges. They play small a lot of the time. They do have one good center, a big man, but they play a lot of 6'6", 6'7", guys at the five. They spread the floor. They like to play fast. They score a lot. Came in that game averaging over 100 per game, albeit three of their four games were against non-D1 opponents,

and they can shoot the ball really well from the outside. It was a weird game because you looked up at the box score at the end, and you're like, none of these numbers are like, outside of the offensive rebounding, are horrible for Kansas, but they only won by six. But you had two banked-in threes from Southern Utah. You get out-rebounded on the offensive glass, I think 14-6. You had one more turnover than them. You struggled shooting at the free-throw line. If you tighten up some of those things all of a sudden it becomes you know maybe

a 15 point game in that one but uh Jalen Wilson unbelievable continues to look like an all-american and that was the type of game that he looked like a national player of the year candidate 33 points just taking over for the game for KU late and how about Grady Dick man he's he's got a pair on him dude he whether he's struggling defensively or coming off the bench like the Duke game at the end for the game for KU late. And how about Grady Dick, man? He's got a pair on him, dude. Whether he's struggling defensively or coming off the bench, like the Duke game at the end, he does not worry about what happened in the past. He's firing.

He's ready to go. And he hits that big three when it's 77-76 to kind of put it out of reach to 80-76. And yes, there are certain worries I have about him because he's kind of struggled a bit defensively in that game as well. But overall you gotta love the duo of him and jalen wilson on the offensive end of the court kansas is gonna have to develop other guys to be go-to scores for you duane harris was that in that game and a lot of times especially when ku was going through some

ruts and did really well in transition weaving to the lane and finishing with some tough layups um who's that guy gonna be for kansas and finishing with some tough layups. Who's that guy going to be for Kansas? And the bench did not really give you much in that game, right? You got really nothing from the five man who came off the bench with Ernest Uday and Zuby Ejifer. MJ Rice struggled off the bench. You didn't really get a ton. Bobby Pettiford struggled off the bench in that game.

Kansas is going to need more from the bench moving forward this season. Even if they don't play a super deep bench, you got to get at least something there. And certainly finding that third option, certainly tightening things up on the defensive end and the rebounding battle will be key. And that is a little alarming that you didn't have that super high effort level in that game that seemed like to be the issue there. but the fact that now you get Bill Self back and even though you went 4-0 he gets a chance to kind of get on the the team's case about effort level like that it's kind of a win-win in all regards uh to a certain level and I said this coming into the game and I think it it rings true looking back on it that was a perfect letdown spot for

Kansas you're coming off the high of the Duke game, and how do you get back up for Southern Utah if they're beating Duke in a close come-from-behind win when you're also looking ahead to next week and you get to go to the Bahamas when it's super cold in Lawrence, and not only do you get to go to the Bahamas, you get to play these really good teams there. It was a very easy letdown spot, and I think that's what we saw. The hustle, the effort wasn't there,

but I think Kansas will get that stuff cleaned up, and Jalen Wilson continues to look like a dude for Kansas this year. That's going to do it for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. Coming up on tomorrow's show, we're going to be joined by Nick Schwert. We'll also preview some of the battle for Atlantis later in this week. If you have anything you'd like for the show to talk about or want to follow along on the action, you can reach out at DJohnsonRadio on Twitter.

And don't forget to subscribe to the show so you're getting all the latest with Locked on Jayhawks. That'll do it for today's episode. Have a good rest of your day. You can catch me on Rock Chalk Sports Talk on a KLWN and Lawrence later today. Deuces.