10 More Thoughts On Kansas

Photo Attribution: US Presswire

I think we’ve all backed off the “we only scored 20 against Kansas” ledge so let’s get to 10 more thoughts on the game (really in-depth stuff here)…

1. J.W. Walsh had about the most J.W. Walsh stat line I can imagine (18/29 for 255 yards, 1 TD, 1 INT, 9 carries for 49 yards and 1 TD). He was really solid in pockets (though never the actual pocket) but I never got the “OK, we got this” feeling I had with Weeden (and to an extent Lunt — though at Arizona we definitely did not have this).

I just think Walsh is what he is — a fun teammate, solid leader, and great backup on what looks to be a contender in the Big 12 for the next few years. Let’s not try to transform him into something he’s not (a starting QB on a top 15 team).

2. Did anybody else see Justin Horton and Quinn Sharp’s 17-step handshake after one of Sharp’s field goals? Maybe I was hallucinating[1. Part of me wants to think I hallucinated everything that happened on Saturday.] but it looked pretty spectacular.

3. What do we trust less right now — a Walsh deep ball or Justin Gilbert in single coverage?

4. Gundy respects Kansas’s defense the way Lindsay Lohan respects herself.

5. Was it just me or was every Fox Sports crowd shot buried in the middle of OSU fans? You could easily see the empty seats dotting (engulfing…whatever) the rest of the stadium but it was like Fox wanted to be like “look, it’s a fun game between two teams that couldn’t beat the best 7-on-7 high school team in Texas, we’re having a blast!”

6. Serious question here: does KU play its basketball highlights or its football highlights to pump up the crowd before games?

7. “Walsh and Stewart are best friends and grew up together” is the new “McCoy and Shipley are roomates and play the guitar together.”

8. The Jayhawk logo fascinates me. First of all, what is it? Second, I’m 100% convinced Kansas uses the same design template for their football field as they do their basketball court. I mean, these are the same size, right?

9. Saturday was one of the more bizarre experiences I’ve ever had watching an OSU football game. I went from “how many records are we going to break” mode to “how many Charlie Weis whale/rain jokes can I get away with before somebody calls me out” mode to “gosh, this is the most boring non-Savannah State game I can remember since 2005” mode to “holy balls are we going to lose to Kansas” mode over the span of four hours. It was not a particularly enjoyable experience.

10. You want to know something weird? We’re halfway through October and only Kansas State, TCU, and Oklahoma State fully control their own destiny in the Big 12 race[2. That is, they are the only three teams that can say “if we win the rest of our games no matter what else happens, we’re Big 12 champs.”].

Here are my first 10 thoughts.