Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - PATH TO SUCCESS: What Jayhawks Must Do in Final 6 Games + Jalen Dupree Kansas Football Film Review
Episode Date: February 16, 2026Kansas Jayhawks face a critical Big 12 stretch—can Bill Self's squad secure a double bye and contend for a top-three NCAA Tournament seed? Derek Johnson explores KU's path to Big 12 glory, analyzing... tie-breaker scenarios, remaining matchups against Houston, Arizona, and Oklahoma State, and the fierce battle with Texas Tech and Iowa State for tournament positioning.Key segments include a film review of running back Jalen Dupree’s potential impact after his transfer from Colorado State and a scouting report on 2027 commit Derek Gonzalez. Derek Johnson breaks down why Jayhawks fans should be excited—and cautious—about future talent, highlighting ongoing challenges in developing high school offensive linemen. With strategic insights and recruiting updates, this episode offers a comprehensive look at Kansas’ basketball and football trajectories.Everydayer Club If you never miss an episode, it’s time to make it official. Join the Locked On Everydayer Club and get ad-free audio, access to our members-only Discord, and more — all built for our most loyal fans. Click here to learn more and join your team’s community: https://lockedonpodcasts.com/everydayerclub Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!5-Hour ENERGYHave your cake & drink it too. Birthday cake-flavor is back, no fork needed. Vanilla-y cakey flavor, caffeinated kick, and no sugar. It's party time. Order Now at https://5-hourENERGY.com or Amazon. MazdaLike our players, we’re driven by the details. Because highlights make the reel. What it takes to get there makes it count.There’s more to a Mazda. Because there’s more to you.Turbo TaxFor a limited time, you can have your taxes done by a local TurboTax expert for just $150 — all in, if a TurboTax expert didn’t file for you last year. Just file by February 28. Take taxes off your plate and get back to your life. Visit https://TurboTax.com/local to book your appointment today. IndeedListeners of this show get a $75 Sponsored Job Credit to help give your job the premium placement it deserves at http://Indeed.com/podcast FanDuelUse your Profit Boost on an NBA future and get entered for your chance to win a trip to the NBA Finals.Play your game with FanDuel, the official sports betting partner of the NBA. Visit https://FANDUEL.COMto 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) Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
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Six games left in the regular season.
What is KU's path to potentially winning the Big 12th,
getting a top four seed to be in a two or three seed in the NCAA tournament.
We'll get to all that on today's episode.
You are Locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks,
part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day.
What's going on, Derek Johnson, with another edition of Locked on Jayhawks.
Thanks for making it your first listen every day.
And thank you for making Lockdown, the number one,
Sports Podcast Network. On today's episode of the show, we're going to get to KU's path to getting a top four seed in the Big 12 tournament.
Potentially, what would they have to do to even win the Big 12 at this point? Also get as good
as seed as you can for the NCAA tournament. We'll break all that down. Plus, we're going to do another film review.
We're going to do Jalen Dupree, the running back transfer from Colorado State. And we're going to do KU Football's
first commit in the class of 2027 with Derek Gonzalez. This episode is brought to you by Mazdo.
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So Kansas loses to Iowa State on Saturday, and that puts them in a bit of a precarious position in terms of trying to still win the conference.
I mean, they were already sitting a game down, and now you're two games down in the loss column to the leader in the Houston Cougars.
and, you know, you look at Ken Palm right now, projects both Houston and Arizona to finish as co-big 12 champions at 15 and 3.
So theoretically, by that, you could say, hey, if Kansas wins out, they can still win the conference.
And I wouldn't disagree there because if you do win out, it would guarantee that Arizona would have a third loss.
It would guarantee that Houston would have at least a second loss.
And in looking at Houston's rest of their schedule two, they still play at Iowa State coming up on Monday.
They still play home against Arizona, potentially tricky game to finish at Oklahoma State.
But, you know, if you beat them, could they lose one of those other games potentially?
Yes, absolutely.
So if you do win out, that's the path right there.
It's if you want to win the Big 12, win out.
If you want to get a one seat in the NCAA tournament, you got to win out in the regular season and in the Big 12th tournament.
So there we go.
There's a one seat for the NCAA tournament.
There's, you know, how you win the Big 12 for this year, right?
Those are very, very difficult things to do, given KU's.
remaining schedule, which again, features Houston, Arizona,
features road games at Oklahoma State and Arizona State.
So features the Big 12th tournament after that,
especially after you just got walloped and, you know,
hanging your head at least a little bit after the Iowa state loss.
So those are the easiest paths to kind of get to, right?
But I kind of remain steadfast under the D,
especially after they lost on Saturday,
that to me, the biggest thing of importance right now is trying to lock up
a double buy in the Big 12th tournament,
which would mean being a top four seed.
And again, it doesn't mean you don't root for winning the Big 12.
And obviously, you should want Kansas to win out from here and have that potential opportunity.
But that first goal for me, the first thing you'd want to check off here is trying to get that double by in the Big 12 tournament.
And the reason why is really twofold for me.
One, even if you are just the fourth number four team in the Big 12, like the Big 12 is so good this year.
There's a chance that Houston and Arizona both get one.
seeds in the NCAA tournament. If not, one of them is going to be a one seed and one of them is going to be a high ranking two seed. There's a chance that Iowa State is going to get a two seed in the NCAA tournament, right? And so if you're fourth in the big 12, like, you could potentially still get a two seed in the NCAA tournament. At worst, you're going to be a three seed in the NCAA tournament. So that's the importance there. For one, if you can be a top four, you know, regular season finished in the big 12, especially given where you are and how many wins it would take to get there, you're going to be a, a, uh, a
two or three seed in the NCAA tournament.
I guess kind of depending how many games you win and what you do in the big 12th tournament,
at worst you're getting a four seed.
But realistically,
you're probably like a three seed at minimum in the NCAA tournament, which is great.
And when you look at how many good one seeds there are in the NCAA tournament this year,
like this is a really good year of top tier teams with Michigan, with Houston,
Arizona.
Obviously, you wouldn't be put with Houston or Arizona.
But you could potentially with Michigan.
You could potentially with Yukon.
You could potentially with, I don't know, some of these really good upon, like Duke.
And so maybe getting a three seed becomes even more important to, you know, two or three seed,
to avoiding that four seed matchup where you're having to play a one seed in the sweet 16.
But beyond all that, too, if we're just looking at the big 12 tournament perspective of A,
how far can you go in the big 12th tournament, but also be the big 12th tournament setting you up on the best path possible in the NCAA tournament.
it involves getting that double buy, right?
Because if you get the five seed to win the big 12th tournament
or to even just play in the championship game,
you're going to have to go through four games in four days.
If you get the double by and you can at least get a top four seed,
you're looking at having to play at max three games in three days.
And one, that can be helpful.
I guess you could lose in your first game of the big 12th tournament regardless,
and then none of it matters anyway.
But that could be helpful to you from a perspective of
If you do get hot in the big 12th tournament, if you do win the big 12th tournament,
now it's not as taxing on you as playing four games in four days.
There's a thinner rotation for KU.
It's also a KU team that as we know, we've diagnosed very deeply the situation with
Darren Peterson.
Is he even going to be able to play back to backs?
Like, is he going to be?
I don't know.
Like, don't you want everybody as well rested as possible?
And if you have questions about how that would go, you want to play as little games
as possible. So that kind of becomes the key
to me is trying to get
one of those seats. So when you look at it, Arizona and
Houston, they're probably going to be top four seats. Right
now, though, there's three teams. Iowa State,
Kansas, and Texas Tech all tied
at 9 and 3 for 3rd
through 5th in the conference basically, right?
Where somebody would get left out
because of the tie breaker right now. And you do have
BYU and West Virginia right behind them at 7 and 5.
But two games back with six games to go.
I want a more focus kind of on the
Iowa state, especially with BYU having some
injury stuff now. Basically, it becomes a three-team race for two spots. That was a huge win for
a tech winning in Arizona, not just for their resume. And, you know, I mean, tech has as good of a
top two wins as anybody in the country. They've beaten Arizona and Duke now. They can, they can play
with anybody. And that kind of backs up what I've thought about tech, that over a regular season
portion, they're not the deepest team in the world. So they're going to maybe have a few extra losses.
You know, I don't think they're going to win the big 12. But in one game sample, once they get to the
NCAA tournament, there is dangerous of a team as anybody, right? Now, you look at the remaining
schedule for them, it's pretty doable.
They only play two games left against teams who are inside the top 50.
Three, if you count DCU, who is 50th, but at BYU, who now all of a sudden, right, if
Richie Saunders is going to be out for a while, I mean, that becomes an easier game there.
You are at Iowa State.
It becomes a game that Iowa State is going to be favored in, right?
But it becomes, you're almost looking at the schedule there and being like, man,
tech could go 14 and 4 in conference play.
But maybe they get to 13 and 5.
That's what Ken Palm has them right now.
Iowa State, meanwhile, at 9-3, they're home against Houston.
They're at BYU.
They have home against Texas Tech at Arizona.
That's a really tough schedule for Iowa State.
So they are projected by Ken Palm to get to 13 and 5 as well.
And that means for Kansas, you're sitting there going, okay, how can you get to 13 and 5?
The big one comes, I think, on Wednesday at Oklahoma State.
If you lose at Oklahoma State, that means that you're only afforded one more loss the rest of the season.
If you win at Oklahoma State, it gives you a little bit more cushion to get to that 13 and
five mark that you're shooting for in Big 12 play.
And then from there, it comes down to it potentially like, what is the tiebreaker?
Well, if two teams are tied, it just goes to the head to head.
Now, obviously, in the case of it being tied with Iowa State, it would be, you know,
one to one.
If it came down to Texas Tech, that's where that win in Lubbock would be so crucial for
KU, right?
Now, if it is tied in just between two teams, right?
then after head-to-head, it goes to winning percentage versus the team occupying the highest position in the final regular season standings.
And that's where it gets really interesting too, right?
Because if you're looking at, I don't know, would it be Houston?
It would be Arizona winning the conference, right?
Like, KU to get to 13 and 5, you're probably having to beat Houston at home.
So if Houston ends up winning the conference, you could potentially have a 1-0 there.
but Houston also only plays Iowa State once and that game's in Ames.
So like, would they win that?
Would they lose that?
The Arizona one, Kansas could potentially, right, if you lose at Arizona, be 0 and 2 there.
Whereas when you look at Arizona and Iowa State, that game is going to be at Arizona for the only time that they play each other.
It is stupid.
It is unfortunate for KU that, you know, potentially they have to play two of the top three teams in the conference twice, whereas Houston would only
have to play Arizona and Iowa State and Kansas once.
And anyway, point being, when you look at things here, that basically means that,
you know, whoever wins the conference could also determine which of those between Kansas
and Iowa State would be higher.
But again, that also makes those shots that Darren Peterson hit in Lubbock even more
important.
Now, if you do get a group of multiple teams tied, right, then you would use each team's
winning percentage against the collective tied teams as a group.
So again, this gets a little bit confusing, right?
The loan exception to this guideline would be if there are only two teams tied in the
group placement, one of the teams, one head to head.
In this instance, the tie is deemed broken in comparison to the seed rather than the placement
will be utilized.
I don't know.
I don't totally understand that.
But kind of how I view that is, you know, would that mean that if you have a three-way tie between Texas Tech, Kansas and Iowa State, Kansas would be two and one in that subset going one-on-one against Iowa State and going one-in-one against Texas Tech.
Whereas Iowa State would, let's see, how do they do against Texas Tech this year?
Okay, they play at home against Texas Tech later.
So they're going to have a chance to be two-in-one against Texas Tech.
And you need Iowa State to win that game, potentially to get Texas Tech to as many losses as you.
So it gets all messed up there, right?
But I guess that'd make them ahead of tech.
So I guess that's kind of the point here.
Get to 13 and 5.
Get to 13 and 5.
And I think you should feel okay about getting one of those spots.
If you want to guarantee it, get to 14 and 4.
Go 5 and 1 down this stretch.
And you'll definitely be one of the top four seeds in the Big 12.
So go 5 and 1, 4 and 2 gets you in the range.
3 and 3.
You're probably getting, you know, the 5 seed in the big 12 tournament.
is kind of the way I look at it now, right?
And this all kind of goes in line, too, with like the seeding stuff.
If you get a top four seed in the Big 12th tournament, at worst,
I think you're going to be a top three seed in the NCAA tournament.
If you do end up being the five seed in the Big 12th tournament,
and now all of a sudden you're winning your first game,
but you're losing your second game.
You might be a four seat in the NCAA tournament, too.
So I think that's how some of the stuff is kind of intertwined.
But we're going to try to have Graham Doran,
we had a great Bracketology show with earlier this week on,
again, sometime in the next week or two.
two to discuss more of these hypotheticals as well.
All right, let's switch gears, talk a little KU football.
I really like Jalen Dupree's tape.
So let's talk about that next.
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For those who show there's more to the score than what's on screen.
You know, let's move past the Iowa stake.
And let's go back to that fun moment everybody had in the KU win over Arizona.
How about the big plays that Price and Tiller made in the first half, man?
He had 14 points in the first half of that game, finishes with 18 for the game.
He's really over this back half big 12 portion of the season shown to be that guy who, you know,
it's a little inconsistent here, there for redshirt freshman, but that consistency tunes up like he's going to be a pro.
He's going to be a future star.
He's going to be that next all big 12 player seemingly for KU with some of the things that he,
shown over the back half of this season. And these are the plays and moments that remind us what
it really takes to raise the bar. It's that extra work off the court, dial in every detail,
given out that extra fire, that grit and never quit attitude. We put that same passion in every
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Discord server. Let's get to our film review of Jane.
Lundupree. We just had a last week, we did a film review on Davy on Crouch. I've watched the
film on a good number of players now, still going through some of the players. And for some players,
they get multiple games, some players I get one. It's just kind of what's readily available to me.
But I came away super impressed with Jayland Dupree, the transfer they brought in from Colorado
State, who came in solid yard per carry numbers, you know, solid yard after contact numbers and
breakaway percentage numbers, more of a, a, again, I don't say this.
say he's going to be Devin Neal because that would be ludicrous with how insane Devin Neal was at
KU, but that type of runner just from a style perspective, kind of the one cut runner who shows good
vision and has a knack for falling forward and doing a lot of the little things and maybe not the
most explosive top end speed. Like I think Devin ran like a four six at the combine, probably
something similar for Jalen Dupree, but has a good seemingly explosiveness for the first, you know,
five to ten yards. And so the game I got to watch actually was
was super helpful from the standpoint of it was the 2025 game that he had this past year against
Washington. And that ends up being, you know, probably the best team that they played on their
schedule. Washington ends up being, what, an eight to nine team out of the big 10? And he had a really
good game in that one. Um, so some of the positives I thought for Dupree, like I thought he showed
some really good vision in general. Like, you really saw the open hole well. I thought he followed
his blocks very well. Like that can be a thing like, you could be a fast running back.
you could be somebody who breaks tackles,
but if you're not following your blocks,
it's not going to be efficient, right?
And so, like, that was one of the things that Devin Neal,
I don't know that he always got enough credit for
from the standpoint of like,
if you look at his yards after contact,
they're still solid,
but maybe it's not as good as another running backer.
I don't know, like if you compare to it,
for instance, like Puka Williams.
Puka Williams is getting more yards after contact per rush than
Devin Neal.
Devin Neal's a better running back than Puka Williams.
One, he could sustain, you know,
more touches and carries.
But that's what,
the vision comes into play because that's going to lead to consistent, you know, plays. It's like,
you need to be able to hit some singles and doubles if you want to be a star running back.
Every play can't be a home run, right? There's a time for those. Like, there are certain players in the MLB who are just there to
hit home runs. And there are certain players who are there just to be contact hitters. The best players
are the ones that can do a little bit of everything. And Jaylon Dupree, really good job of kind of doing that.
And honestly, like, that is one of my favorite skills in running backs.
And I think one of the most underrated skills in general of running backs is to have good vision.
So really don't discount this of how important that is.
But this is another really good skill that I think goes underrated.
Like the ability to get skinny into tight running lanes or holes.
Like sometimes the block is going to be there, but the hole is not going to be, you know, the, I don't know, the most obvious answer that like, hey, you have to get skinny and kind of squeeze through here to get five yards.
And sometimes guys don't show the ability to get through when it is kind of the smaller running lane.
And they try to bounce it outside when it's not there because they didn't want to get skinny in the hole.
Dupree is not one of those guys.
There's a really good job there.
And that's a lot of times where the hidden yards are found where a lot of the winning yards, the short-yard situations can come really in handy.
So I really like that.
Again, fell forward a good amount of time to find more of those hidden yards.
He still did a good job running to the outside, though, which becomes super important.
and KU's scheme that likes to utilize the wide zone still here and there.
And that just becomes super important for what KU wants to do.
I really like some of his past protection clips too.
I mean, multiple like clips of him sacrificing his body or being really good in past protection.
Like that'll get coaches to love you and get you on the field as well.
So I was really impressed with that.
If we are going to touch on a few negatives here there,
I would say not maybe the most explosive after you get past a certain yardage,
Mark, 5, 10 yards, whatever you want to say in terms of like top end acceleration,
not really running away from guys a ton.
He is able to get to the speed he needs to be successful within that first 5 to 10 yards
and potentially get a 15, 20 yard run.
But he's not going to necessarily, like he's not going to be Dylan Edwards from an explosive
level, right?
But we saw Devin Neil be able to, you know, have the most.
career rushing yards for a KU running back with, you know, four, six speed, which was good,
but not, you know, again, not, I guess Dylan Edwards or Puka Williams.
I would also say this is not something that's necessarily a weakness.
It's just not something I got to see on films.
I don't know for sure, but all the routes that I saw him run out of the backfield were all
either flats or just like checkdown options.
That could just be more about the offense.
That could just more about, you know, the playbook or the limited sample size of the one
game that I saw.
So I don't know.
It could just not be a super diverse route tree, although, you know, thinking about it,
KU doesn't run a super diverse route tree from the running back either.
So I don't know how much it matters, but I don't know, just picking nets.
Because honestly, I came very, very impressed with Jalen Dupree.
Like, I'm on this dude as a real shot to be KU's running back one as soon as this
year, to be completely honest with you.
Like, I think he's a really good player.
Now, obviously, that's not a guarantee because I do think Yacine Willis is a good player.
I do think Dylan Edwards is a really explosive running back.
So there is a chance you could be, you know, any of those guys could end up being running back three, not because they're not a good player, but just because the other guys they have are good running backs, right?
But it would not shock me if this dude was running back one.
And if he does stay at KU, he's a redshirt sophomore.
If he does stay at KU for three years, I'm going to say this right now, like he'll have a season where he rushes for a thousand plus yards at KU.
Bold statement and one that I feel like I'm standing on the table a little bit for, but I really like Jalen Dupree's film on tape.
So hopefully I get you a little bit excited about what he can bring to this table.
But again, it's going to be a really good running back competition.
That's for sure.
Okay, let's get to KU Football's newest and first commit in the class of 2027 with Derek Gonzalez.
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Okay, so KU has their first commit of the class of 2027 football.
It is Derek Gonzalez.
He is a 6'4-6-280-pound offensive tackle from La Puente, California, and goes to Nogales High School.
He's an 87-rated three-star, so pretty solid.
rating there and somebody who you know in watching some of the highlights looked like he had a very
heavy punch um now i don't know necessarily the the competition he was playing that's the thing with
like california you think of california being this like heavily populated state which it is but
there are many pockets throughout california which are still like you know smaller schools that
you're playing against and stuff um and so i i don't know the competition like he's not in the
the league that you look out for in in california you've got a league with like modern day and
Narboni and some of these different schools, I think Narboni, anyway, a bunch of these different schools like Notre Dame and I don't know.
There's like some of these private schools like Shamanad and stuff.
But point being, the guys that he went up against, like he's blowing back with a very heavy punch.
Like his punch, his arms, his strength were able to keep guys in front of him or if not in front of him on the grass because he was able to just kind of knock them over.
It was interesting because from from athletic perspective, like they constantly were.
using him to pull or climb to the second level.
And he buried a lot of smaller defenders, which shows a good bit of being able to move
and still block your guy, which would be good for KU because they like to use him that way.
I wouldn't call him the fastest runner.
Like he looked a little slower to me on tape, but he was effective.
He was getting to where he needed to go.
And that was a good thing.
He showed some reps.
Mostly it looked like it as a left tackle, but it seemed like summit right tackle.
So good for versatility there.
I didn't see a ton of highlights on the highlight film that I watched.
of like pass blocking. I did see one where I think the footwork probably will need to be worked on a little bit for
KU, which can be a plus minus. Like on one hand, you know, that's something that's going to have to be
worked on and need to be improved. But on the other hand, means if he's already a good football player now and
there's an area to fine tune it, that means he could be a stud, right? So there's two ways to look at that.
But overall, really strong run blocking tape. I liked the hard hands. He's six foot six. He has the
exact frame you're looking for for a tackle. The thing is, like, I think everything about this on paper,
what the highlights I watch, 87 rated three stars, a good number to be at, like the size that
everything like that would say this is a really good addition for KU, especially to start off the
class of 2027. The only thing that gives me pause here is KU's track record now with this staff
in terms of, I don't know if it's the identification process or the development process. It can kind of be a
chicken and egg situation.
But things have not gone well with developing the high school linemen they brought in.
Again, is it just missing on the evaluation or is it the inability to put?
Because right now, the only guys they've really developed in-house.
And if you did want to count, like, I don't know, guys that they brought over from
Buffalo potentially, like, I guess you developed Nolan Gorsica a little bit, but he was
never, he's never been a starter for KU.
I'm trying to think James Livingston, who probably.
be on the two deep again this year is somebody who you've developed from the high school level,
but again, not a starter. Calvin Clements is a high school guy for you and he's at least
started for you, but there were some mixed results last year. So that's something that the staff
is going to have to start, you know, figuring out. You need to be developing these guys in-house.
I think this is the right play to be able to do that. I like this edition on paper, but, you know,
you're going to need to see the results. Now, as far as where it puts KU in the class of 2027,
this is their first commit. So obviously, many.
to come for KU. It'll be interesting how many they add on the offense line. We've talked a lot about
that, you know, KU's offense alignment, like their top six guys might all be juniors. So, you know,
do you put more investments into this year's high school class or in the following year's high
school class? Maybe put more into this year just from a standpoint of, hey, that allows you to,
when all the juniors this year would then be seniors, they'd be true freshmen, then they could,
redshirt a year. And then by the time all the seniors are gone, you'd have a bunch of redshirt
freshman linemen. But maybe it makes sense to divvy it up a little bit more. And then just in general,
I feel like we've typically seen KUB somewhere around 12 to 20 high school commits in a year,
12 to 15 high school commits in the year and then kind of fill it out from there via the transfer
portal.
So we'll see what the class has to offer.
But I'd imagine, you know, they're going to be pressing to get some more commits here
before the start of the spring.
All right.
That'll go for this episode of Locked on Jayhawks.
So you can find our show anywhere you get your podcast, including on our YouTube page
where you can like and subscribe to the show.
We'll be back at you on tomorrow's episode.
we're going to be breaking down some of the numbers of where KU was at with and without Darren Peterson on and off the floor.
We'll do another film review on tomorrow's episode.
And then we'll get to our KU Oklahoma State preview coming up on Wednesday night.
See you next time for another edition of LOJ.
