Where do we go from here?
The 2024 Kansas football season came to an end over the weekend thanks to Baylor putting a whooping on the defense. Despite only scoring 17 points, the KU offense ended up having a fairly decent day and was good enough to get a win. However, if there was an outside chance of getting a bowl bid at 5-7, the team we saw on the field didn’t do much to make a case that it should go to the Jayhawks. Overall, this season has to qualify as disappointing with a senior laden group and the return of the 2023 Big 12 Preseason Offseason Player of the Year in Jalon Daniels.
There will be those that want to go beyond disappointing and from my perspective, those fans/people have memory-holed too many years of KU football. The program has only been to 14 bowl games in its history. It went from 2010-2021 without sniffing a bowl game. The five coaches before Lance Leipold was hired combined for a .185 winning percentage. Leipold’s already won more games at Kansas in 4 years than those previous 5 coaches combined won and has double the number of conference wins as those coaches. He has earned my trust to guide the program in the direction he wants for at least a couple more seasons before I’m going to even consider the possibility that KU could do better.
With that said, there are some lingering questions that are worth discussing before we got to the 2025 season.
Question #1: How disappointing was this season?
This might be the most complicated to answer and probably deserves a deeper look than I’m going to give it today but adding some context may help us in processing this season. The program was looking good after a strong 2023 season and the hope of Jalon Daniels returning to form. Those hopes took a bit of a hit with the loss of offensive coordinator Andy Kotelnicki to Penn State but with a strong group of running backs in Devin Neal and Daniel Hishaw, the floor was still going to be pretty high. The schedule looked to have some winnable games but many people recognized that 5-7 was entirely possible last summer. In the end, the schedule ended up being a tough one. Using ESPN’s College Football Power Index, the Jayhawks played the 34th toughest schedule in FBS football and the toughest in the Big 12. For what it’s worth, Sagarin has the schedule as the 6th toughest. Kansas didn’t lose to a single team that ended the season below .500. The combined record of the teams that beat KU was 59-25, that’s nothing to be ashamed of! Add in really good wins against Iowa State, BYU, and Colorado and we’re left thinking “what if” but we know college teams always win and lose a few games they shouldn’t on paper. Maybe talent wise this was just about a .500 team? As a KU fan, I’ll take that even though it could have been better.
Question #2: What happens at the QB position?
Jalon Daniels is a redshirt junior that has now played what appears to be a full healthy season. He didn’t live up to the hype he was receiving when he was named preseason player of the year but he was also a perfectly adequate college quarterback. The start of the season was rough as he and new offensive coordinator Jeff Grimes were working to come up with a game plan that worked for the offense and Daniels specifically. While fans never seemed to accept it, the offense ended up being pretty damn good. Sticking with ESPN’s FPI, the offense finished ranked 17th overall and 2nd in the conference. Can a program like Kansas afford to move on from a QB that was able to lead that kind of offense? They’ll need to replace Devin Neal, which won’t be easy but running backs also seem to be the easiest position to replace so who knows what the replacement ends up looking like. Cole Ballard is the only other QB on the roster that even attempted a pass this year and I’m pretty sure he’s not the answer.
There’s always the portal but relying on that to find a better QB seems like quite the gamble. I never dreamed that Will Howard was the type of quarterback that would be a fit for Ohio State while K-State was perfectly happy replacing him with Avery Johnson. Older, experienced players having the opportunity to try new places is a big change to CFB and if Daniels isn’t coming back, I hope Leipold’s already narrowed down his targets because we didn’t see any of the other guys on the roster this year and that might say something.
Question #3: Does Leipold make a change on the coaching staff?
While the offense came around this season, the defense never did, finishing 66th in ESPN’s power index. This is not a new thing for KU since Leipold was hired. Over the last 3 seasons, the offense has had ranks of 17, 7, and 8. The defense has been at 66, 60, and 99. While special teams haven’t been stellar, the defense has clearly been the weak link during Leipold’s tenure. Brian Borland and Leipold have been coaching together since 2007 when Leipold was hired at Wisconsin-Whitewater. When Leipold took the head job at Buffalo, he brought him with him. Then did the same thing when he was hired at Kansas. I have a really hard time seeing a change being made here but I do believe it’s a unit that has to improve for KU to become what I think it can be with Leipold in charge. Maybe later in the offseason, I can do a deeper dive on some of the issues on the defensive side of the ball that move beyond the generic complaints of constantly employing soft coverage while also not being able to get pressure on the quarterback.