K-State’s 2024 season is finally here
It’s been a long off-season, underlined by everything that’s happened this past year. The Power 5 is now the Power 4, the College Football Playoff has a new format, and none of the conferences make any geographical sense at all. Nothing about college football is as it once was.
But no matter. It’s been 247 days since their last real game, but the Kansas State Wildcats finally take the field for the first time today. The Avery Johnson era begins in earnest in Manhattan tonight when the Cats kick off against UT-Martin at 6:00 PM GOTZ. As always, game-specific details are in Jon Morse’s How To Watch post.
As excited as we are to see Johnson in action, this is a team sport and there’s plenty of talent around Johnson too. You already know about Jayce Brown, Dylan Edwards and Sterling Lockett. But for his part, Chris Klieman thinks underrated players on his “deepest roster yet” might be the key to success this season.
Klieman is now in his sixth season as Kansas State’s head coach (where did all the time go?!), and as much as the program has changed, his views on football have changed too. Klieman’s ability to make changes from one season to the next may be the reason the Wildcats are among a handful of Big 12 teams expected to contend this year. But he’s mostly escaped Bill Snyder’s shadow and maybe that’s the biggest change.
This is the first Kansas State season in ages that does not involve Collin Klein in some way. New co-offensive coordinator Matt Wells brings a wealth of head coaching experience to the sidelines and he and Avery are already in perfect sync. Along with co-coordinator Conor Riley, expect to see Wells throw some wrinkles we have not seen before into tonight’s game.
If things go according to plan for Kansas State in this game, we could also get a better look at the Wildcats’ backup QBs including transfers Ta’Quan Roberson and Jacob Knuth, who have been in close competition.
The new Big 12 is already 5-0 on the season. Let’s hope our Wildcats can add to that.
GO CATS!