Kansas Football’s Favorable Upcoming Schedule

Believe it or not…Kansas only lost four games last year.

Yes, we are still talking about football.

Of course, every year there is a recurring story of teams looking to avenge losses from the previous season or build on new winning streaks. The Big 12 was once the best example of this in college football.

Why?

There were only ten teams. A nine-game conference schedule meant every team played every team every year. That meant that every conference loss from season to season had the opportunity to come back to haunt fans for another twelve months.

But not anymore.

The Big 12 has grown to a whopping sixteen teams, and the schedule of each original flagship program has been completely turned on its head.

However, this has proven to be beneficial for the Jayhawks.

Today we're looking at a specific question: Does Kansas benefit from the fact that more than half of the schedule is different?

I guess we'll find out soon.

The roster of out-of-conference teams is virtually identical to last season. Missouri State is replaced by a similar FCS opponent in Lindenwood, the home-and-away against Illinois will be completed in Champaign, and UNLV is another Mountain West opponent that will pad the win list, a role Nevada played last year.

The Big 12's schedule, on the other hand, has a lot more rotation. West Virginia, TCU, Arizona State, Houston, Colorado and Baylor will all face the Jayhawks this fall. Half of those teams haven't done so at all since joining the conference, and none of them were there last year. They replace Texas, Oklahoma State, Oklahoma, UCF, Texas Tech and Cincinnati, all of whom face the Jayhawks in 2023.

The teams that will be on the schedule in 2023 but not in 2024 finished last season with an overall record of 48-31.

The upcoming opponents they replace finished last season with a combined record of 28-45. Only one of them, West Virginia, was able to finish with a win.

Of course, record is never the only determining factor in a team's strength or quality, but in this case it is a very telling statistic. While the road trip to Kansas State and a home game against Iowa State in the second half of the schedule are cause for concern, overall the Kansas Jayhawks have a far easier path to the top of the standings compared to last season.

According to ESPN's post-spring power rankings, Kansas is scheduled to play only one top-25 team. Last season, the final College Football Playoff rankings included four opponents of the 2023 Jayhawks. Each of the top-three teams in the Big 12 rankings dodges the Jayhawks' schedule … as Oklahoma State swaps out and Texas and OU split for the SEC.

Obviously, the average quality of opponents in the Big 12 as a whole is lower than it used to be. When high-caliber teams like Texas and Oklahoma leave a conference, the title race will never be as exciting as it once was, no matter how well they regroup.

In the past, this could be seen as a bad sign for Kansas in terms of playoff participation. Florida State was eliminated from the College Football Playoff just last season despite going undefeated in a power conference because of a lack of truly quality wins.

However, with an expanded 12-team playoff format, teams with relatively questionable skill levels have a much larger safety net. All in all, Kansas would be virtually guaranteed a playoff spot by simply winning the Big 12 Conference.

If winning the Big 12 is the only way to make the playoffs, and winning the Big 12 requires reaching the finals, then the key to the Jayhawks' success lies in their regular season schedule. Reaching the Big 12 Championship Game, a very lofty but attainable goal for 2024, seems relatively easier for Kansas than in past seasons.

Anytime a Jayhawks fan can truthfully say these words, there is undoubtedly hope in sight.