Kansas football: Defense must improve for Jayhawks in 2020

Kansas football really struggled last season on the defensive end, which will need to change in 2020 if the Jayhawks are going to win more than a few games.

Last season, Kansas football struggled at times to get stops on defense. As a matter of fact, the Jayhawks ranked No. 122 out of 130 in total defense in 2019 according to the NCAA, so something needs to change in 2020.

Defensive coordinator DJ Elliot will be sticking around, but Kansas will have quite a few new faces on the defense due to a number of seniors graduating. Bryce Torneden, Elmore Hempstead Jr., Azur Kamara, Najee Stevens-McKenzie, Mike Lee, Jeremiah McCullough, Hasan Defense, Jelani Brown, and Codey Cole III all played big roles on the defense in 2019 as seniors, so the Jayhawks will have some shoes to fill.

In terms of returners, Kansas will have linebacker Gavin Potter back for his sophomore season. Dru Prox will also return after being injured against West Virginia. At the time of his injury, Prox was on pace to lead the Big 12 in tackles for the 2019 season, so having him back will be a huge help.

Junior corner Corione Harris may also return according to Kansas football’s roster for next season, which lists him. Harris got into some trouble back in January, and was suspended indefinitely by head coach Les Miles, but that situation seems to have been put on the backburner due to the coronavirus.

So what would should we expect from Kansas football’s defense in 2020? Well, they need to be better next season than they were in 2019 considering it’d be hard to be much worse. The Jayhawks gave up a whopping 36 points per game, and getting that number under 25 would be huge.

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If Kansas football is going to win more than just a few games in 2020, the defense will have to step up. Despite a ton of graduations, Elliot should be able to rally the troops around a solid group of linebackers and get Kansas going on the defensive end.