KNOW THE FOE: Key Kansas players to watch Saturday against Iowa State

[The Rob Gray]

KNOW THE FOE: Key Kansas players to watch Saturday against Iowa State

Kansas junior running back Devin Neal (4) yells out with fans after an interview on the field at David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium Saturday. © Evert Nelson/The Capital-Journal / USA TODAY NETWORK AMES — Iowa State quarterback Rocco Becht described his performance as far from his best. His head

cyclonefanatic.com

 

[SCarolinaCy]

KNOW THE FOE: Key Kansas players to watch Saturday against Iowa State

Kansas junior running back Devin Neal (4) yells out with fans after an interview on the field at David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium Saturday. © Evert Nelson/The Capital-Journal / USA TODAY NETWORK AMES — Iowa State quarterback Rocco Becht described his performance as far from his best. His head

cyclonefanatic.com

Neal has track speed and is lightening fast. If he get in space, he is gone for TD.

 

[CascadeClone]

So I just watched OU-KU since I'm at home sick. Here's the amateur scout on KU.

Offense:
Neal, Bean, and Hishaw are all super fast. Any of them can go the distance given space. Must not let them break free.
O-Line was good, but not dominant. Their receivers looked average.
They run a ton of goofy window dressing motion pre-play. Don't get sucked into that.
They run some wildcat, and had a play where they had Neal take the snap, and run option with Bean, then pitched to Bean for a pass.
Bean doesn't strike me as a great passer; couple of picks and didn't seem super accurate. But he is fast so is happy to run. MUST keep contain on him or else. Bean's feet are my personal biggest worry for ISU.
Even with all the weirdness, they executed pretty clean. Well-coached.

Defense:
OK, but not great. OU demolished them with the run early and then gave up on it some. Just straight up run defense, not great. Safeties hit hard. DL may lack the size to simply clog up run game.
Pass defense was OK at times, but OU definitely had guys get loose. OU didn't pass much, mostly rain I think, and in 1st half they just ran over them.
Obvious passing downs, KU stunts a LOT. And it was effective. Knowing ISU historical problems with UNI stunting, I hope Clanton has that figured out for our guys.

Special teams:
Kicker missed a 42 yarder, made a couple others. Didn't have many/any touchbacks (could have been the rain, idk). They dropped a KO which led to a TD for OU. Seemed average otherwise, punting and coverage okay.

Miscellaneous:
OU gave KU this game. Pick 6 in 1st Q. Turned it over 3 times (though so did KU).
Dropped a KO after KU made a FG, and KU ran a QB keep zone read untouched for a TD on the next play. Boomer committed a TON of penalties; had 3 personal fouls including a targeting on ONE KU drive early 4th quarter. Essentially gave them 3 touchdowns.
Just a ton of super dumb mistakes cost OU an easy win (reminded me of a lot of ISU games the past couple seasons...)
It was a physical game. Lots of KU guys got dinged. They might be a little beat up and tired next week.
KU looked smaller than OU (not shocking) but very fast.
KU will make a few big plays; need to keep chins up and stay the course. They will also make some bonehead mistakes; need to capitalize on those.

 

[Billups06]

So I just watched OU-KU since I'm at home sick. Here's the amateur scout on KU.

Offense:
Neal, Bean, and Hishaw are all super fast. Any of them can go the distance given space. Must not let them break free.
O-Line was good, but not dominant. Their receivers looked average.
They run a ton of goofy window dressing motion pre-play. Don't get sucked into that.
They run some wildcat, and had a play where they had Neal take the snap, and run option with Bean, then pitched to Bean for a pass.
Bean doesn't strike me as a great passer; couple of picks and didn't seem super accurate. But he is fast so is happy to run. MUST keep contain on him or else. Bean's feet are my personal biggest worry for ISU.
Even with all the weirdness, they executed pretty clean. Well-coached.

Defense:
OK, but not great. OU demolished them with the run early and then gave up on it some. Just straight up run defense, not great. Safeties hit hard. DL may lack the size to simply clog up run game.
Pass defense was OK at times, but OU definitely had guys get loose. OU didn't pass much, mostly rain I think, and in 1st half they just ran over them.
Obvious passing downs, KU stunts a LOT. And it was effective. Knowing ISU historical problems with UNI stunting, I hope Clanton has that figured out for our guys.

Special teams:
Kicker missed a 42 yarder, made a couple others. Didn't have many/any touchbacks (could have been the rain, idk). They dropped a KO which led to a TD for OU. Seemed average otherwise, punting and coverage okay.

Miscellaneous:
OU gave KU this game. Pick 6 in 1st Q. Turned it over 3 times (though so did KU).
Dropped a KO after KU made a FG, and KU ran a QB keep zone read untouched for a TD on the next play. Boomer committed a TON of penalties; had 3 personal fouls including a targeting on ONE KU drive early 4th quarter. Essentially gave them 3 touchdowns.
Just a ton of super dumb mistakes cost OU an easy win (reminded me of a lot of ISU games the past couple seasons...)
It was a physical game. Lots of KU guys got dinged. They might be a little beat up and tired next week.
KU looked smaller than OU (not shocking) but very fast.
KU will make a few big plays; need to keep chins up and stay the course. They will also make some bonehead mistakes; need to capitalize on those.

I caught most of the game on Saturday. Agree with all of your statements. KU's corners are pretty physical (and big) and play a lot of man coverage; Higgins/other WR's should see plenty 1v1 matchups, especially if we're moving the ball on the ground. I was impressed with their d-line, active and generated a decent pass rush.

On defense we've got to limit the number of times we have a LB on Hishaw/Neal in coverage, bound to give up some big plays if that's our approach. Have to force KU's offense into passing situations.

 

[NotJustMagic]

Great write up - Gotta make Bean take the check down and see if he makes mistakes. Make them have the 15 play drives and see if they get impatient and make mistakes. Spying him and actually getting him stopped or held up until support can come will be big.

Love the idea of our WR's in 1v1. Que up D.Jackson & Higgins for big games.

 

[werdnamanhill]

Worried about the speed thing. Our LBs don't seem particularly fast all the time.

 

[ZRF]

Worried about the speed thing. Our LBs don't seem particularly fast all the time.

They aren't, nor do they do anything exceptionally well. If I'm KU I'm targeting as much of my gameplan as possible at exploiting that weakness. Misdirection, level targeting, etc. Also, if we struggle to get any sort of pass rush, I'd run some design clear outs (deep routes that take the secondary and defenders back) and tell Bean to take off. I'd make us show we can track him/tackle him in space, something I'm not sure we can do.

 

[Clonefan32]

Thank goodness Tampa's targeting ejection happened when it did. We will need is speed and physicality out on the edge in run support.

 

[ZRF]

Thank goodness Tampa's targeting ejection happened when it did. We will need is speed and physicality out on the edge in run support.

Not only that, but it also let to Surge being put into the game with some coverages and he was TORCHED on one of those TD plays. He didn't even look fast enough to be a backer, let alone a dback. Our secondary is good but we (apparently) don't have a lot of depth beyond the top 6 or so guys. Not if he was the next best option.