Welcome to the Ultimate College Football Preview for 2023. Every team in FBS Football will be covered in this daily blog release. All of your favorite teams from the ACC, AAC, Big 12, Big 10, C-USA, MAC, Mountain West, PAC 12, SEC, Sun Belt & even every Independent. Think of these daily college football previews as a cheat sheet going into next year.
2022 Recap:
The Wildcats had a hell of season last year. They went 10-4 overall, 7-2 in conference, and were the Big 12 Champions. One of the only negatives of last year was the loss in the Sugar Bowl to Alabama. Everyone loses to Bama. Kansas State should be very happy with winning the most competitive conference in football last year. To beat TCU, who up until then was undefeated all year in the Big 12 Championship game took a lot of heart. They finished the year at 14 in the AP poll even with the Sugar Bowl loss. I think all in all it was a very successful season for Kansas State.
Head Coach:
Coach Klieman is doing one hell of a job down in the little apple. In his 4 seasons in Manhattan, he has 3 winning seasons, 1 conference championship, and a bowl victory. That is a damn good start especially taking the head job from the legend Bill Snyder. He already has half the conference championships as Snyder, but needs to win bowl games and keep the consistent winning seasons going. Klieman definitely has the coaching prowess to be the next great Big 12 coach. His job before taking over at Kansas State was at North Dakota State which was his first head coaching job. He was only there as head coach for 5 years, but he won 4 FCS championships with one third place finish. That is what we call a winning tradition. He then proved it last year, only his fourth year at Kansas State, that he could bring home hardware. I like when doing a college football preview that I can compliment a coach, not bash.
Key Players:
My favorite part of doing a college football preview is learning about the studs coming back to school. QB Will Howard is back for his Senior year after splitting time last year with Adrian Martinez. He only played in 7 games due to the splitting of time, but still put up great numbers. Howard had a 59.8% completion percentage for 1,633 yards. Howard had 15 touchdowns and 4 interceptions. They have a huge hole at running back to fill with Deuce Vaughn and his 1,936 scrimmage yards and 12 TDs leaving for the NFL. DJ Giddens and his 518 yards, 5.8 ypc and 6 touchdowns will be one of the guys trying to fill that. Where they may struggle on the offensive side of the ball is at WR. Only one WR on the depth chart, RJ Garcia, caught any passes last year. Garcia only had 7 catches for 70 yards and 1 touchdown. Austin Moore, the team’s leading tackler from last season, is back. He had 87 tackles, 10 TFLs, 2 FFs, 1.5 sacks and an interception. Let’s just say watch the tape. This will linebacker was everywhere last year. Their best player in the secondary coming back is Kobe Savage. Savage had 58 tackles, 3 TFLs, 3 Ints and a FF. He is a very good safety in coverage and in supporting the run game. DE Brendan Mott who had 6 sacks last season is the best rusher back, but needs to be better on every down.
2023 Prediction:
The Wildcats have a very underwhelming non-conference schedule, which will definitely help their record. They have home games vs. South Eastern Missouri and Troy. Two easy wins. Then they do have a little more difficult road game at Missouri that they should win. I will say at worst 2-1 more then likely 3-0. The conference road games are Oklahoma State, Texas Tech, Texas and Kansas with only one back-to-back week of road games. They should go 3-1 in these games; at worst 1-3. The home games this year in conference are UCF, TCU, Houston, Baylor and Iowa State. I think the first three home games are wins. UCF and Houston are new to the conference and it is a step up. TCU lost so much talent from last year’s team. I don’t like them at all this year. I think Baylor, Kansas State might be the game of the year no one is talking about. Iowa State is always pesky. I will say, at least 3-2 with 4-1 being a very good home stand for conference games. The ceiling is 10-2 and the floor being 7-5. I would take them to win 9 games; that would be my best call for Kansas State this year. A very good team in a very competitive conference. This college football preview was positive but is it the best for the Big 12?
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