my way to early prediction on the season:

Sat, Sept. 6 SE Missouri State at Kansas W
Sat, Sept. 13 Kansas at Duke L
Sat, Sept. 20 Central Michigan at Kansas W
Sat, Sept. 27 Texas at Kansas Memorial Stadium W
Sat, Oct. 4 Kansas at West Virginia L
Sat, Oct. 11 Okla. St. at Kansas L
Sat, Oct. 18 Kansas at TTX L
Sat, Nov. 1 Kansas at Baylor L
Sat, Nov. 8 Iowa State at Kansas W
Sat, Nov. 15 TCU at Kansas W
Sat, Nov. 22 Kansas at Oklahoma L
Sat, Nov. 29 Kansas at Kansas StateS L

Yeah I wouldn't project Iowa State as a win if I were you.

Oh Rusty. LMAO

LMAO

ISU will struggle to find 4 wins this upcoming season. They are going to be bad.

Aug. 30, 2014 NO DAKOTA ST - W (That was being generous)
Sept. 6, 2014 Kansas State - L
Sept. 13, 2014 at Iowa - L
Sept. 27, 2014 Baylor - L
Oct. 4, 2014 at OK State - L
Oct. 11, 2014 Toledo - W
Oct. 18, 2014 at Texas - L
Nov. 1, 2014 Oklahoma -L
Nov. 8, 2014 at Kansas - L
Nov. 22, 2014 Texas Tech - L
Nov. 29, 2014 West Virginia - W
Dec. 6, 2014 at TCU - L

Oh leave the guy alone, with the retirement of the timberwolves coach he may lose his bball coach as well.

They're in the same boat as Kansas. Let's not forget how bad the Kansas program is.

I'm confused on what is so funny about my prediction.

I'm not exactly giving KU the world here.

Then again if they could play a season where they got to avoid the three best teams in the conference like MU did last year then perhaps I could give them a few more W's.

You have us beating TX. I’m going to be 49 this summer I don’t think we have beaten them in my lifetime. That might be a little optimistic for this year. I would say we would have a much better chance beating WV .

I don't see too many folks having a chance at beating Texas moving forward. Charlie Strong is going to change the culture at Texas into something that's going to slap every member of the Stoops family in the nads.

Us beating UT is as likely as the Chiefs winning a playoff game. :huh:

You may very well be right. But they nearly had them last time they were in Lawrence and I just have a feeling that it's going to be a year with a new coach that KU finally breaks through.

It might help if can get his QB healthy

Report that Heaps has left the program.

Source: Frank Boal on Twitter

Good.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p>Top 5 pro-style QBs in 2010 class per Rivals...Jake Heaps, Philip Sims, Connor Wood, Brett Nottingham, Jesse Scroggins...Whoops</p>&mdash; Matt Smith (@MattSmithCFB) <a href="https://twitter.com/MattSmithCFB/statuses/461313327306928128">April 30, 2014</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

I remember being stoked about Heaps. Who wrong I was...

Nice.

And yet, he was at meetings today?

If Heaps chooses to leave, np. Truth? If he can't win a starting QB position at KU, where the F* is he going to go?

Lol keep dreaming.

True enough. I just assumed it was to be QBing the checkout line at Hyvee.

WTH is this? This is a KU football thread. Not a thread to discuss ISU basketball.

http://www2.kusports.com/news/2014/m...dium-facelift/

KU has designs on Memorial Stadium facelift


Kansas University is moving forward on plans to renovate Memorial Stadium — seen here in a file photo from 2012 — but athletic director Sheahon Zenger says an actual facelift won't begin in the near future.



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Kansas University’s athletic department has hired HNTB, a Kansas City-based architecture firm, to draw up blueprints for Memorial Stadium’s future renovations, but there are no plans to break ground any time soon, according to KU athletic director Sheahon Zenger.

“We will have the designs in place,” Zenger said during a recent interview with the Journal-World, “so that when we have momentum and the deck is cleared, we’ll be ready to go.”

According to Zenger, HNTB is in the final stages of developing its renderings, and those plans currently are being vetted through the appropriate groups on campus, by members of the athletic department and outside stakeholders.

What’s the holdup?

“It’s not lost on me and shouldn’t be lost on anyone else that we need a little momentum in football to inspire the donors whose help we’re going to need,” Zenger said.

Kansas, which sits in the middle of a stretch of five consecutive losing seasons, has gone 9-39 in four seasons since the forced resignation of Mark Mangino. That mark includes a 3-9 season in 2013, Charlie Weis’ second season as head coach. Weis signed a five-year, $12.5 million contract that expires at the end of the 2016 season.

A 3-9 record does not qualify as momentum, but it did end a string of five consecutive seasons with diminishing victory totals (12, 8, 5, 3, 2, 1). The Jayhawks enter 2014 with their most experienced roster under Weis, particularly on defense, but will have relatively inexperienced sophomore Montell Cozart at quarterback.

Zenger isn’t waiting for football fortunes to turn around before tackling other facilities additions and improvements.

With major projects still ongoing at Rock Chalk Park and progress on the DeBruce Center, which will house James Naismith’s original rules of basketball, and the Fieldhouse Apartments right around the corner, Zenger said the focus was on finishing those so that all of the department’s attention — both in terms of fundraising and planning — could be devoted to Memorial Stadium.

Although no exact price tag has been determined because plans and possibilities for upgrades and renovations at Memorial Stadium vary and remain a work in progress, estimates put the first-phase value alone around $60 million.

Zenger has said all along that the project, whenever it gets underway, likely would be executed in steps.

The first phase, which could include lowering the field and removing the track, would be the most significant.

“The key is to bring the stands in and make it more intimate,” Zenger said. “Engineers are telling us we can lower the field. We don’t know if we would or how much.”

It’s questions like those that make up the vetting process of which Zenger spoke.

Once the first phase is past — again, at least a couple of years from now — the subsequent steps would address things like adding club-level seating to the east and west sides of the stadium and giving both the bowl and the south end zone a facelift.

“The track will come out regardless,” Zenger said. “Where we’re at is, which is the greatest priority? We know that the field and the west side are the first priorities, and they could be combined.”

Because of the stadium’s status as a true memorial, Zenger said the department and architects have taken great care to honor the past while moving the venue into the modern era.

For too long, Zenger said, athletic facilities at KU were left alone. While those that existed certainly served their purpose and were great sources of pride for the fan base even then, leaving them unchanged for so many years has made upgrading them now a greater challenge.

Zenger, who is in his fourth year as KU’s athletic director, said the task at hand would have been even more difficult had it not been for the proactive nature of his predecessor, Lew Perkins, and his staff.

“You don’t want to look backward,” Zenger said. “But we really went through a period of time here in the not-so-distant past of two to three decades of not really building much or renovating our facilities. I’m very grateful to the regime before me that was able to renovate Allen Fieldhouse, renovate and build more on the baseball stadium and then build the football practice fields and the football building. That was really a yeoman’s work.”

During his time at Kansas, Zenger and his staff have built upon that progress. But with football being king in the current landscape of college athletics, the Memorial Stadium makeover might carry the most weight, and Zenger appears to be well aware of that.

“We’re deeply embroiled in several significant projects at this time,” Zenger reiterated. “And we’re trying to clear the deck all of these very important projects so we can turn all focus and energy toward Memorial Stadium.”

That's good news, especially the part about removing the track. Of course, I assume this means that if Weis and staff don't see major improvement in the team in the next couple of years that Zenger will be looking for a new coach (before Weis's contract is up).

In the guys defense, it's hard to get a pass completed when you have no O-line and the receivers can't catch. Cozart can at least move, and with Harwell you have improvement with receivers, but our line isn't anything to write home about.

which is why having a mobile QB is needed.

This article in the Salina paper kind of ties in. Not much money out there is the impression I get. Donation boxes to maintain equipment is kind of desperate.


LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) — Lawrence officials are spending more than $22 million for the new Rock Chalk Park Sports complex in northwest Lawrence while also seeking donations at recreation centers in other parts of town to help maintain current equipment.

Tim Laurent, Lawrence recreation operations manager, says donation boxes at recreation centers aren’t a sign the city is struggling to fund the maintenance of existing facilities and equipment now that money is being devoted to Rock Chalk Park. He says residents who take Parks and Recreation classes pay a fee, while people who use the fitness rooms aren’t required to pay fees.

But Lawrence resident Anne Schulman told The Lawrence Journal-World that the donation boxes are “a slap in the face to residents who live in other parts of town.”

ttp://salinapost.com/2014/05/01/lawrence-seeks-donations-for-recreation-equipment/

2017 before a shovel is in the dirt? That is rough.

Donations are donations. Nobody is demanding a fee.
KU has 5 major projects going on for the AD alone, not to mention multiple projects for the engineering school, new business school, and several projects on the west campus supporting bio and pharma research. Add on the KU Med Center and Cancer research center additions, and you've got a whole lot of development.

Thing is, our big-money donors need to step up for the Memorial Stadium upgrades to happen. The KSU-leaning legislature is not approving any bonds for KU sports facilities. Either the alumni step up, or KU football goes the way of Wichita State football.

Maybe they shouldn't have fired Mangino. He didn't seem to have any problem fielding competitive teams in that stadium.

Let's live in the present. Different AD, different coach, different conference.

I don't think the legislature is anything more than a convenient excuse. They turned down bonding a luxury apartment complex for bball. That construction should be privately funded in my mind because it produces nothing. And it's more of a luxury than a need in my opinion.
And after being rebuffed KU funded it privately.

The bigger picture here is that with the emphasis on JUCO recruits last spring, you lose a lot of the roster during the time Zenger claims the need for momentum. KU could be better next year and not see it in the record. It's a tough position to be in right now.

You are aware KU was going to pay for that anyway, they just wanted lower borrowing rates. The state wasn't going to be paying any of the bills. I'm sure you know that but I just wanted to make sure.

Yes sir. I was quoting the feelings of the legislative committee that denied it. BC's statement that it was the KSU leaning legislature made me chuckle. Because it's a lazy excuse. IMO

Has KSU received any bond support for improving their facilities from the state?

I think it's more the severe anti-tax, anti-govt political environment in the legislature right now more than it is a KSU bias. The dream-dorm just has terrible optics.

That said it's an important reminder for KU admins to realize what state they're operating in and how they need to cultivate relationships across the state much better than they have. Like KSU does. Outside of Johnson County, KSU dominates the state in exposure, student recruiting, etc etc. They spend time visiting schools in rural areas while we spend time recruiting international students and kids in Chicago that can't get into Illinois. That's why their undergrad enrollment has finally caught ours after 160 years of trailing.

Of course KSU has. And so has KU. All the way back to the funding of Allen Fieldhouse.
It's a weak excuse.

Pfft, there's plenty of money. They just want to see wins. It's not rocket science.

That has more to do with KU's increased academic standards rather than our "failure" to reach out to the state of Kansas.

You're absolutely correct about our inability to form positive relationships with the state legislature, however.

Those standards were changed in 2013. The enrollment gap was nearly closed before then.

Drunk posting isn't for me. I meant to say that KU is more selective with their applicants (by a negligible amount, now that sober Chiefspants examines the data), our new academic standards won't even go into effect until 2016.

You are right, however, KSU's enrollment has been absolutely exploding over the past decade.

If KU is against most of what the Kansas State Legislature is doing these days then I know KU is doing the right thing.

We could probably have a pretty spirited discussion about KU's politics on the DC board if you want to start a thread about it. If you were correct, our enrollment wouldn't be stuck at the same 1980 count. (24,000 in 1980 - 24,000 in 2012). Meanwhile Johnson County has exploded from 200k to almost 600k in that time and our enrollment.....is flat. It should've exploded with it. Something is very broken in Lawrence KS.

Most definitely. Lawrence was once considered one of the booming towns through the 90's and early 2000's.

You have to have a better local economy and job market for that to sustain. It's basically turned into a hippy bedroom community for Kansas City... that happens to have a college in the middle of it.

Sad, cause that's my home. :(

Seeing that Lawrence's population has nearly doubled since 1980, I'm not buying your whole "there's something broken with Lawrence" hypothesis. Whatever is wrong with KU's enrollment is limited to KU alone, not the city around it.

I was referring to KU. I don't care about Lawrence the town.

The population grew a shit metric ton through the 90's... because so many people loved it there and stayed there after graduating KU... but still worked in KC somewhere... And a lot of people that disliked Topeka moved to West lawrence as well... The people profiting from this were the construction companies through the 90's.... that capitalized on that boom. How many of those construction companies are now out of business? My father benefited from that time, and has since had to close the doors of his local shop... The only thing that really grew in Lawrence was the Bedrooms. The city has done a piss-poor job of establishing anything of substance in businesses... Hallmark has been a stalwart, but they were there long before the population boom.

Ah, Gotcha.

As someone born in 1992, I could be way off here, but is it possible Lawrence's housing expansion (and subsequent stagnation) in the 90's-00's was linked to the economy at the time?

What i'm saying is the local commerce or business sector did not expand WITH the residential in lawrence. It is fully dependent upon KC... Lawrence failed to capitalize on this as a whole... obviously there were some good businessmen that did so for themselves, but the City as a whole failed.

Thank you for the clarification! As someone just now getting involved in projects with the city of Lawrence, it's intriguing to learn about its history.

Enrollment matters in football because the more students = more fans at games and more future alumni in attendance. KSU finally passed KU in undergrad enrollment this year 24,581 to 24,435. (KU was at 26,999 in 2008).
http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2013/de...-across-state/

"In 2013 more than 45 percent of KU's Lawrence and Edwards students came from a single county: Johnson."

So to recap: the enrollment at KU was the same in 1980 as it was in 2013. Johnson County exploded in population and KU gets almost 1/2 (!) their students from there. That can imply only one thing: while we rode the growth in Johnson County, we concurrently are getting dominated across the rest of the state by KSU.

Congrats!
 

3* QB Ryan Willis from Bishop Miege (my Alma Mater) - Son of former K-State kicker, Steve Willis, committed to ku today. Congrats! Great kid, and great Family. Ryan passed on the K-State offer when Hays QB, Alex Delton, committed to K-State in Feb. Wish we could have had both.

Happy to have him. He sounds excited to headed this way.

You have a link to this statement?

Willis is the higher rated player. Just curious why you say this when it wasn't up for discussion who is the higher projected recruit.

Regardless of the ratings, it's a good possibility. It can certainly help sway a kids decision having another recruit committed at your position (when there's only one that plays on the entire team). That being said his statement is probably more conjecture than verifiable truth.

I can't link it, but I've heard it from the horses mouth. As soon as the dual threat guy verbally commuted to ksu, Willis was a heavy ku lean.

Does anyone know they release the times for the games?

How about his Daddy? I've known their Family for decades.

I think its roughly 9 or 10 days before the game. All football games have to be TBD until then, because the Big 12 TV contracts give the networks the ability to wait until 10 days before kickoff to pick the games they want to televise, and times for the games they pick can be moved.

@JayhawkSlant: Andrew Turzilli and Jake Heaps have graduated and leaving the #KU program. Darrian Miller also leaving #kufball

The fugg?? I thought he was supposed to pllay again this year.

Wow, that ****ing sucks about Miller.

Heaps going to Miami.

Weis gets Cory Butler from Utah. More WR's the better.

This after stealing a huge tackle a few days ago in Larry Mazcyk.

Best case, worst case: Kansas
June, 18, 2014
JUN 18
3:00
PM ET
By Max Olson | ESPN.com
128COMMENTS0EMAILPRINT
On Monday, we started our series on the best-case and worst-case scenarios for each Big 12 team.

The premise of these fun posts is to examine what the season may look like if everything fell into place for each school -- the best-case scenario for 2014. Conversely, we’ll also show what might happen if everything goes wrong -- the worst-case scenario. The truth, as usual, should fall somewhere in the middle.

We continue the series today with Kansas.

BEST CASE

Seven wins. Kansas' first winning season since the Mark Mangino era. Let's see how we can make this work.

[+] Enlarge
John Rieger/USA TODAY Sports
An 8-5 season would result in a lot of celebratory Gatorade baths for Kansas coach Charlie Weis.
Kansas whoops FCS Southeast Missouri State in the opener. That's easy enough. But it will have to be a real butt-whooping, a glorious display of the Jayhawks' potential, because they need a confidence booster before they go on the road to play reigning ACC Coastal Division champion Duke.

In this game, KU gets lucky. Montell Cozart runs around in the pocket enough to trigger some form of potent post-Manziel stress disorder in the Blue Devils that causes receivers to get bafflingly wide open. Cozart takes advantage, Kansas receivers actually catch touchdowns, and it's all so amazing.

The Jayhawks go to 3-0 after taking care of business against Central Michigan. They give Texas a scare akin to 2012 in their Big 12 opener, but come up just short. Good thing there's an easy rebound game the next week against West Virginia. But the game that puts Kansas on the national radar is a startling easy win over Oklahoma State, one that sends the Pokes to 3-3. Kansas, at 5-1, is the talk of the country.

And just as Charlie Weis is being hyped up for doing one of the nation's best coaching jobs, his annual check for $2,054,744 from Notre Dame -- the check he gets to not coach the Fighting Irish -- arrives in the mail. Life is so sweet.

Even road losses at Texas Tech and Baylor can't kill Weis' vibe. KU gets to six wins and bowl eligibility by knocking off Iowa State at home. Weis carries the goal posts out of the stadium himself and throws them into Potter Lake. He begins contract extension negotiations the following Monday.

Fans fear their beloved, revived Jayhawks have run out of magic when they lose to TCU and Oklahoma the next two weeks, but this ain't over. Kansas goes into Manhattan and hands Kansas State a 21-point beatdown as revenge for five straight losses in the rivalry.

The Jayhawks go to the Liberty Bowl and make a rebuilding SEC team (how about Missouri?) look like a "pile of crap" (Weis' words, not mine) to finish the year 8-5. Yes, that's right, 8-5. Weis gets a pay bump to $5 million a year, and the Jayhawks are well on their way to a new dynasty.

WORST CASE

Kansas exits nonconference play with an encouraging 2-1 record after squeaking out wins against Southeast Missouri State and CMU. The Duke game got ugly; let's just not talk about it.

But the offensive transition under new OC John Reagan is a rocky one, and Cozart can't keep up. He gets benched after four straight Big 12 losses in favor of Michael Cummings, who runs a little more but doesn't make much a difference. KU gets back in its rut of changing the game plan every week in a futile attempt to expose opponents' specific weaknesses.

Ben Heeney finishes with an admirable 146 tackles and earns second-team all-conference honors, but the rest of the defense is a work in progress that makes little progress. KU notches one Big 12 win, in overtime at home against Iowa State, but loses the rest to finish 3-9.

Charlie Weis resigns following another rough loss to Kansas State. The search committee moves quickly to replace him, overlooking the next Gus Malzahn and instead hiring former Colorado coach Gary Barnett, who desperately wanted the KU job in 2011.

Oh, and one more thing: The day after Barnett is introduced at Kansas, Miami quarterback Jake Heaps is runner-up for the Heisman Trophy. Life is so cruel.

R.I.P. Football Track.

As soon as it was announced that a world class track facility was being constructed on the west edge of town we all knew this day would come. It's bittersweet. The Kansas Relays and other collegiate events held at Memorial Stadium have been historic in what athletes have achieved there. On to the next…

http://cdn.running.competitor.com/fi...3/JimRyun7.jpg

What it will look like before the season starts...

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Bqmm6eCCEAAM_rt.jpg

Charlie will never resign. He has it made at kansas.

Pics of the track being torn out on twitter...
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Bq-0iLrCUAALYwa.jpg:large

Wow. They didn't grind off the rubber first? I figured they could recycle it and gain back some dollars.

This is exciting. Perhaps not exciting as little bro getting a 100M facelift, but this will have to do right?

What The ****?
 

http://www.cbssports.com/collegefoot...s-confusing-us

I realize this was a camp for recruits, and he was talking about the turnout of recruits, but for him to take a pic and tweet it with his comments is ROFL

DGB to Oklahoma becoming real.

NCAA rules prevent him from taking photos of recruits. You just got trolled by CW.

Nice demolition derby park.

Apparently, we can only handle 3 or 4 facilities projects at a time.

About time Chunky Cholly starts trolling other fanbases. We've been trolled by him two full years.