Lance Leipold’s sixth year at the helm of KU football is incoming.
While back-to-back seasons without a postseason game have dampened the mood slightly around David Booth Memorial Stadium, there is still plenty of hope around the potential of this KU squad.
Most hope lies in the fact that the coaching tree Lance Leipold is enlisting feels like a step up from last year’s largely inexperienced corps. Andy Kotelnicki is back in town, promising young coach and former cult hero Joe Dineen is with the program now, and there should be a natural improvement from second-year defensive coordinator D.K. McDonald.
However, right now, we're dealing with hypotheticals, when the only thing set in stone is Kansas’ schedule.
Today’s task is to break up KU’s schedule into three different categories, similarly to what we sid around Kansas’ basketball schedule last month.
Layups: These are the few games on the schedule where we feel anything but a Kansas win is disappointing.
Coin Flips: These will be the games decided by the thinnest of margins. Think of Kansas’ win over UCF and losses to Arizona, Missouri and Cincinnati from last season.
Underdogs: There isn’t much need for explanation here. Kansas will walk into these games not expected to win and very well may not. We wouldn’t recommend you to, but if you insist, at its worst think about Kansas’ 42-17 loss to Texas Tech or 38-14 loss to Iowa State from last season.
Layups
LIU (H), Middle Tennessee (H), UCF (H), West Virginia (A)
The Mountaineers may be a bit of a bold choice to throw in here as year two under Rich Rodriguez is bound to be better than No. 1, but with that game so deep into the schedule, Kansas should be at full form and you should expect a win, or maybe that 42-10 win from last season is weighing on our minds too much.
In Scott Frost’s first year at UCF in his return, Kansas scraped a gritty 27-20 win that saw an impressive defensive backbone that was hardly seen for the rest of the season. This will be one of the few games marked on the Big 12 schedule where fans will feel confident and it needs to be taken advantage of,
Coin Flips
Arizona State (N), Kansas State (A), Baylor (H), TCU (A), Oklahoma State (A)
Trying to gauge how any of these teams is going to do next season is almost like throwing darts blind. Oklahoma State and Kansas State are undergoing coaching changes. Baylor and Dave Aranda don’t seem like they are eye-to-eye right now; Arizona State has had two polar seasons in two years under Kenny Dillingham, meaning TCU comes into next season looking the most assured. Ultimately, this is the stretch that will define Kansas’ season. The Jayhawks could walk away with a 1-4, 2-3, or a 3-2 record.
Underdogs
Missouri (H), Utah (A), BYU (H)
Last season, Kansas suffered a gut-wrenching 42-31 loss to the Tigers where KU couldn’t stop a nosebleed. Seeing as Mizzou is set to have Ahmad Hardy back, that will be a tall task for any team in the country to stop.
Of course, with Kyle Whittingham off to Michigan, there are no guarantees it will be business as usual for the Utes, but until they prove us wrong, expect them to host the Jayhawks as a big favorite.
With Brendan Sorsby out of the Texas Tech picture, there is suddenly a lot of space for the Cougars to lead the Big 12. In the 2025 campaign, Sitake’s two losses on the year both came to the Red Raiders, proving he has shaken losing to a lesser opponent.
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