Kansas football: Jayhawk defensive should be at full strength vs. West Virginia
Kansas football opened this year with some tough health issues and the Jayhawks’ crippled defense gave up 47 points at home to the Cowboys.
This week the Jayhawks are catching their breath after a 47-7 knockout homecoming loss to Oklahoma State. Coming off the narrow defeat, Kansas football is trying to regroup and pull the loose strands of their quickly collapsing season together.
If quarterback troubles weren’t enough, the issues continued to snowball as the Jayhawks saw multiple injuries affect their defensive presence on the field last week. This gave many players the chance to step up and show they’re worth. Junior safety Davon Ferguson had an impressive 8 solo tackles on the day. “He’s special” are the words Coach Miles used when discussing Ferguson’s showing on Saturday. The Cowboys mowed through the Jayhawks for a combined 593 yards on the day.
Looking forward, Kansas is going to need their defensive weapons back in the lineup. As of Wednesday night at Hawk Talk, it seems this is going to be the plan. Head coach Les Miles has confirmed that corner Kyle Mayberry, linebacker Gavin Potter, and safety Ricky Thomas are set to return in Kansas’ next game against the Mountaineers.
This is good news for Jayhawk fans, as it means the hatches will be tightened on the air attack next week. West Virginia is seventh in offensive efficiency in the Big 12 right now. This is something Kansas should look forward to taking advantage of next week. The Jayhawks need to get quick guys like Kyle Mayberry in the air to help advance our pass rush. This is going to give us more control defensively, giving us more chances to put the ball back in our hands.
The Jayhawk defense is healthy and back in practice this week. Despite last week’s blowout, I’m fairly optimistic about how we plan to cover our tracks next week against West Virginia, head coach Les Miles commented on the defense the other night at Hawk Talk: “We want to play and we want to be competitive.”
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We should expect some changes next week, and with the right moves on defense, we may see a more level style of play from the Jayhawks. There is a lot of faith put into the leaders Kansas’ has on defense, and getting those leaders back into the lineup should only improve morale going forward.