K-State’s young defensive end ready to make a splash
MANHATTAN — Kansas State football defensive coordinator Joe Klanderman called it a grand slam and Buddy Wyatt, their position coach, is visibly excited.
Chiddi Obiazor, Jordan Allen and Ryan Davis, he Wildcats’ three defensive ends from the 2023 recruiting class, have yet to show what they can do on game days, but it appears that is just a matter of time.
“That d-end class a year ago has got a chance to be really special,” Wyatt said of the three redshirt freshmen. “We’ve got some really good players that are big, fast and strong. So, it’s exciting to see those guys getting better.”
Of the three, only Obiazor got on the field last season, appearing in three games while preserving his redshirt year. He had one tackle in the season opener against Southeast Missouri State and one tackle, and then had a stop, credited as a tackle for loss, against North Carolina State in the PopTarts Bowl.
“Coming in (last) spring definitely helped me, so I feel like I’m a little ahead of the game,” said Obiazor, a 6-foot-6, 267-pounder from Eden Prairie, Minnesota.
“(But) I feel like with the extra year that I had and the extra semester that Ryan and Jordan had has definitely helped us a lot.”
K-State now starting its fourth season with a three-man defensive front since making the switch from a 4-2-5 look in the 2021 season opener. Obiazor, Allen (6-4, 250) and Davis (6-4, 249) provide the kind of length and size needed to pull that off.
Allen, from Olathe South, was a topfive prospect in Kansas for the 2023 recruiting cycle, while Davis, a Phoenix product, was a top 15 in Arizona.
“Chiddi kind of stood out a year ago because he got here in the spring,” Wyatt said. “The other two guys didn’t get here until the summer, so they were a little bit behind.
“Now they all have had an opportunity to learn the scheme and learn how we practice and learn our expectations, and it’s good to see.”
Not that Wyatt is going easy on the three of them.
“I don’t let them know that,” he said with a smile. “I’ve got to keep them humble. Keep them hungry and humble.
“I’m a believer that the better they are, the harder they want to be coached, and so I stay on them pretty good.”
Besides, Obiazor, Allen and Davis have plenty of competition for playing time. Seniors Brendan Mott, a starter last year, and backup Cody Stufflebean both are back at end, as is promising sophomore Donovan Rieman. And then there is explosive sophomore Tobi Osunsanmi, who has moved up from linebacker, and sophomore transfer portal addition Travis Bates from Austin Peay.
Not only that, but undersized nose tackle Jevon Banks is seeing more action at end than in the middle.
“I feel like with the addition of Jevon and Tobi, there’s a lot more competition,” Obiazor said.
For Wyatt, the biggest challenge may be finding playing time for all the ends. There is so much depth that the Wildcats have experimented this spring with using three ends at once.
“I like to play a lot of people, as you know,” Wyatt said. “It’s going to be a juggling act, and it’s going to be based on those young guys.
“If they’re ready to play and they put in the work and we know we can count on the and they know how to do it, they’ll play.”
Arne Green is based in Salina and covers Kansas State University sports for the Gannett network. He can be reached at agreen@gannett.com or on Twitter at @arnegreen.
LAWRENCE — When the Big 12 Conference announced its Big 12 Mexico initiative last year, it included putting Kansas’ men’s and women’s basketball programs at the forefront.
The two Jayhawks teams would face their Houston Cougars counterparts in Dec. 2024 in Mexico City. They’d all play a part in Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark’s desire to grow the conference’s brand, while also providing new experiences for athletes and potential name, image and likeness (NIL) opportunities. And they wouldn’t count against any of the teams’ conference records.
But earlier this month, the Big 12 announced Big 12 Mexico has been delayed and now has a target date of 2025. In a post on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, the conference pointed to other new initiatives — including adding new schools to the Big 12 — as reasons why. Speaking Thursday, Kansas men’s basketball coach Bill Self did not express disappointment about the decision.
“I’m glad,” Self said at his team’s end-of-season banquet. “Yeah, I’m glad. Our schedule is loaded enough. I should say I’m excited about it, period, but that would probably be an overstatement. That’s a long way to go for one game. So, we’ll be team players and try to help the league but that’s not one — I’m probably glad that we’re not doing that.”
This past season alone saw Self’s Kansas squad play Kentucky (neutral), Marquette (neutral), Tennessee (neutral), UConn (home), Missouri (home) and Indiana (away) in non-conference play. That’s before competing in one of the best, if not the best, conferences in the nation. Brandon Schneider, the Jayhawks’ women’s basketball coach, had a schedule this past season for his side that included non-conference games against Penn State (away), Virginia Tech (neutral), UConn (neutral), Texas A&M (away) and Nebraska (home).
Houston men’s basketball coach Kelvin Sampson, according to a report from the Houston Chronicle, also expressed happiness about the Big 12 Mexico delay. Sampson even went as far as to say he was never a big fan of it. The report also left open the possibility that neither Kansas nor Houston will be the participating schools when the games are played.
Jordan Guskey covers University of Kansas Athletics at The Topeka Capital-Journal. He is the National Sports Media Association’s sportswriter of the year for the state of Kansas for 2022. Contact him at jmguskey@gannett.com or on Twitter at @JordanGuskey.