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James Westling checks in.
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00:00Sports Daily on KFH.
00:04And now, digging deeper with the teams you follow.
00:07It's another Sports Daily Insider interview on KFH.
00:13Welcome back.
00:15Sports Daily on KFH, 1240 AM, 97.5 FM.
00:19Listen on the Odyssey app.
00:20Also, 12 News Connected to watch the stream.
00:24And now joined by Big 12 Insider, James Westling.
00:28You can find them all over the place.
00:30Play-by-play for ESPN and NBC.
00:33And also, co-host of Big 12 today.
00:37James, how are we doing on this Monday?
00:39Man, I'm good.
00:40Excited to be with you guys.
00:42Congrats, Brady.
00:43Big news from over the weekend.
00:45Yeah.
00:46So, just, man, I'm super excited for Week 5.
00:49It's hard to believe that, like, a full month of the college football season is behind us.
00:55It's crazy to me that we're talking about, like, Week 5 already.
00:58You know, you got all the anticipation all season.
01:00I know you know you're doing all your research all season, looking at the teams you're going to cover and
01:06just the entire conference.
01:07And all of a sudden, yeah, we're in conference season, pretty much.
01:10It's crazy.
01:11Hey, and K-State opening their conference slate on the road at Cincinnati and just didn't go how Wildcats fans
01:21wanted.
01:21We had Wyatt Thompson in earlier.
01:23Disappointment was a word that he used.
01:26Cats were favored by a touchdown in that one.
01:29Defense had some issues.
01:31The run game had some issues.
01:33What did you see?
01:34What's your takeaway from that one for K-State, James?
01:37Yeah, I think my number one takeaway is that Nate Woody, who is the defensive coordinator at Cincinnati and was
01:45the defensive coordinator last season at Army, has Avery Johnson in Kansas State's number.
01:51I mean, they – we actually had Scott Satterfield, the Cincinnati coach, on our Big 12 show this morning.
01:58And he said very directly their game plan was to take away Avery Johnson and his legs because two years
02:07ago when they played in Manhattan, Avery Johnson went off, had a huge game on the ground.
02:12And so Cincinnati spent the entire week preparing for Avery Johnson as a runner.
02:18And I don't think it's any coincidence that Avery threw 50 passes, a career high, 10th most all time in
02:25a K-State single game.
02:27That's just way too many.
02:29Like, the formula for success for Kansas State was not that.
02:33And I felt like K-State kind of abandoned their ground game, at least on first down.
02:39Like, K-State usually runs the football 70% or 80% of the time on first down.
02:44You want to stay on schedule.
02:45Kansas State threw the ball on first down 19 times.
02:50They ran it 14 times on first down.
02:54Meanwhile, Cincinnati ran the ball 19 times on first down and threw it only four times all game.
03:02So Cincinnati was very dialed into their game plan, whereas I felt like Kansas State in the second half kind
03:08of abandoned their game plan.
03:10And Colin Klein's in his first year, these are teachable moments, not just for the team, but for him and
03:16his staff as well.
03:18So that's a very long-winded way to say that it was a disappointing loss for K-State, no doubt.
03:23It has been the argument basically for since Avery Johnson showed up on campus at Kansas State of how do
03:29you get the best version of Avery Johnson?
03:31Our listeners are hearing it ad nauseum from us.
03:35As you're saying, only six carries, right?
03:37Like, he's good because of the chaos that he provides to the offense.
03:43Last year, they really tried to turn him into a pocket passer, it felt like, whether that was by his
03:48accord or by the staff's accord or things like that.
03:51Is that just a product of Cincinnati just not allowing him to, you know, really showing him like, hey, we're
03:58going to let you throw it or just what happened?
04:00I think it's a little bit of both.
04:02I mean, I was disappointed that there weren't more designed quarterback run plays because the two long runs that he
04:11had just a week ago against Tulane were both designed for him.
04:15Like, I know that fans see how fast he is and exciting he is and you want to see him
04:20get outside the pocket more when plays break down.
04:23I'd love to see more.
04:24Call his own number.
04:26Designed quarterback runs just weren't there.
04:30And the other side of that is I do, as I watch him and have watched him for the last
04:36three years, he looks like, and I could be totally wrong on this.
04:40I have no inside information, but he looks like a guy that is trying to prove so hard that he
04:47can be a pocket passer that he eliminates the thought of taking off outside the pocket.
04:53It's like he's trying to convince NFL scouts that he can be a next level quarterback because of his ability
04:58to throw.
04:59If I'm K-State, I'm more concerned with let's just win the game and your number one skill set.
05:06And I think he is a good passer.
05:07I think his passing has improved, but he is still the fastest guy on the field.
05:13And for the fastest guy on the field to only have six carries, that just doesn't cut it for me.
05:19Yeah, for sure, James.
05:20You know, another disappointment I had, and granted, as you hinted to before, during the game, I was actually getting
05:27married.
05:27So I was actually, like, watching the game, but, you know, doing a little research after the fact and looking
05:33at the box score
05:34and even following along kind of late in the second half when things kind of dialed down and Amy and
05:40I were finally able to eat, I learned that.
05:43Boy, those photos take away some grub time for sure.
05:46But the defense, you know, we were so high those first three games.
05:53And granted, lesser competition, but the defense, to me, was kind of a big eyebrow raiser and a big chunk
05:59yardage
06:00and just how many rushing yards they allowed from Cincinnati.
06:02Well, that's what Cincinnati does.
06:04And Cincinnati has one of the best offensive lines, not just in the Big 12, but nationally.
06:10I mean, they are a program that, coming into the season, they're on that Joe Moore watch list,
06:17which is the award that goes to the best offensive line in the country.
06:21They have three future pros.
06:24They have three All-American offensive linemen.
06:26And they manhandled Kansas State.
06:29And I think the step up in competition was definitely a factor.
06:35What they did is they completely negated K-State's pass rush because they didn't care to throw a pass at
06:41all.
06:41And when they did, they completed 21 yards per catch.
06:45So it was the perfect game plan for Cincinnati.
06:48They were going to lean on that offensive line.
06:50They have two very dynamic, explosive running backs.
06:54Both are home run hitters and can go the distance on any given snap.
06:58And they were determined that over the course of the game, they could wear Kansas State down.
07:03And they did.
07:04And ultimately, I mean, the final was even a little bit misleading because K-State had a late touchdown to
07:10close the gap to within five.
07:12I was just, I was surprised that, you know, like Colin Klein has a lot of Bill Snyder characteristics.
07:18Well, Bill Snyder was nails when leading at the half.
07:22I mean, he had like a 96% winning percentage, something just insane.
07:26Kansas State led at the half.
07:27So I was surprised to see Cincinnati for the second week in a row, you know, come from behind and
07:33really seize momentum and wear K-State down like they did.
07:36James, one more on the cats before we look at the league as a whole here.
07:39Kind of the feeling that you feel on Monday morning that we're trying to dig through now for K-State
07:44is the way that I described it is that it was a hype machine that was building and building since
07:49they hired Colin Klein.
07:50And people were talking about a favorable schedule and if they take care of business, they'll be talking about the
07:55playoff and then they go lose to Cincinnati on the road the very first time that they hit the road.
07:59It feels like the crashing back to earth, back to reality situation here.
08:05What should they make of it?
08:06Like it stings for all those reasons.
08:08But is that the truth?
08:09Yeah, and I think we will learn that as the season progresses.
08:14I mean, there's two ways to look at it.
08:17The glass half empty version is what you're talking about.
08:21If K-State, if somebody had told me before the season, hey, K-State goes 9-3, I wouldn't have
08:25had Cincinnati on my bingo card as one of those three losses.
08:29That's the downside.
08:30The upside is that you still have the same schedule the rest of the way.
08:34Utah and BYU play each other.
08:36Texas Tech and Houston already played each other.
08:39K-State has Houston coming up in a couple of weeks.
08:42That is a massive game for Kansas State.
08:45If they win that game, then I think they're right back in the conversation.
08:48Like this was week one of Big 12 play essentially.
08:51If Kansas State beats Houston at home, you know, there's a pretty good chance that K-State can either run
08:57the table the rest of the way or worst case scenario, I think 9-3 or 8-4.
09:03So, I think we'll find out a lot more for that game because Houston's really good.
09:09But Houston is kind of a matchup nightmare for K-State because they have a dual threat quarterback.
09:15Their rushing defense has been really good.
09:17Their passing defense, not so much.
09:19So, Avery's going to have to make plays with his arm in that game here in a couple of weeks.
09:26Big 12 insider James Wessling with us here on Sports Daily on KFH.
09:31Got about five minutes left.
09:33And just FYI, the silver lining is that K-State will at least host Houston in Bill Snyder Family Stadium.
09:40James, looking at the rest of the weekend as far as the Big 12 slate, not a lot of great,
09:46great matchups.
09:47Still some non-con scheduling getting finished up with.
09:51But Oklahoma State goes to Morgantown.
09:55They beat the Mountaineers pretty handily, 41-24.
09:59Does the Big 12 need to be on notice about the Cowboys?
10:02Very much so.
10:03And that's another team that's on K-State's schedule.
10:06However, K-State gets Oklahoma State in Manhattan.
10:09There are three teams I wouldn't want to play right now from the Big 12.
10:13And none of them are Texas Tech.
10:14I would not want to play BYU.
10:16I would not want to play Utah.
10:17And I would not want to play Oklahoma State.
10:19Oklahoma State had not gone over 600 yards of offense since 2023 when they were in the Big 12 championship.
10:26They've now done it in back-to-back games.
10:28Against Murray State, they had it almost by halftime.
10:31And against West Virginia, where they just – West Virginia was very much in this game.
10:36Even led 24-21 midway through the third.
10:39And then Oklahoma State, after Drew Mestemaker threw an interception, four of his next five passes were over 40 yards.
10:46I mean, he just went off.
10:48Those Oklahoma State receivers are dynamic.
10:51Their running back is one of the best backs in the country in yards after contact.
10:55It has just like this natural ability to never take a hit that's not right on his pads.
11:04He's just tremendous at that.
11:06And I think Oklahoma State, with their improvement defensively from a season ago – because remember, their defense isn't why
11:13they lost to Tulsa.
11:14And I think that game really woke them up.
11:16Those are the three headliners for me in the Big 12.
11:19And the league, the league collectively – so there's five teams in the top 25.
11:25The Big 12 has not had five teams ranked this deep into a season since 2015.
11:31So that was 11 years ago.
11:33So the league's in a really good spot overall.
11:36I lied.
11:37I'm going to ask one more question about the K-State game.
11:39But for the other side, Cincinnati's 4-0.
11:42Like, how much should we look at this from the other coin?
11:44Is Cincinnati good?
11:45Their running backs ran for like 300 yards.
11:48Yeah, I think they're a good football team.
11:50And that's why I'm not as down on the loss is because just, like, taking that game in – and
11:57I was on the air at the same time.
11:58So I had to watch it, you know, yesterday knowing that K-State lost the game.
12:02But it felt like, to me, those were just two sound, like, eight, nine, maybe ten, win football teams.
12:09Like, this wasn't a loss to the worst team in the league by any means.
12:12K-State was favored, sure.
12:14But, no, this is Cincinnati's best start since 2021 when they made the college football playoff.
12:21Like I said, their offensive line is dominant.
12:24So, no, it's not a bad loss to me.
12:27It's just frustrating because it felt like it was there for the taking.
12:31You said the five teams in the top 25.
12:33The Big 12 has turned itself into a reputation of the teams just doing, you know, steel cage wrestling matches
12:40against each other, it seems like.
12:41Somebody's always going to have, like, six losses and end up in the Big 12 championship game, it feels like.
12:45That's hyperbole.
12:46But when there's five ranked teams in a league that usually does that, there's going to be some weird results
12:51by the end of this thing.
12:52Yeah, there are.
12:53And, I mean, the fact that Texas Tech and Houston have already played each other and they're both still ranked
12:58bodes well for the league.
12:59Utah and BYU play each other.
13:02BYU plays Notre Dame here in about three weeks.
13:04That's a massive game for the conference.
13:07So, I think this, like, perception of parity and competitive balance, I think it's going to look a little bit
13:14different this year.
13:15These teams at the top, they just, they look really good.
13:18Better to me than collectively they looked last year.
13:22Awesome stuff as always, James.
13:24Hey, James, what's your next game?
13:25Where can we watch it?
13:27TBD.
13:28So, the schedule, I'm off this weekend.
13:31And next weekend, I will find out sometime later this week.
13:35Okay.
13:35Where were you at this weekend during the K-State game?
13:38This weekend, I called the State Fair Classic here in Dallas at the Cottonville, which is like the HBCU.
13:47It's a big game for the sport.
13:49It was a lot of fun.
13:50Very cool.
13:51Always look out there for James.
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