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Posted
by Matt Tait
October 31, 2012 at 12:02 p.m.
Three & Out with Baylor...
• Kansas Jayhawks (1-7 overall, 0-5 Big 12) vs. Baylor Bears (3-4 overall, 0-4 Big 12) •
— 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 3, Floyd Casey Stadium, Waco, Texas —
Opening Las Vegas Line: BU -17
Current Las Vegas Line: BU -17
Television: FSN
Three and out, with Baylor...
First down
By now, you surely have heard that Baylor quarterback Nick Florence — a 10-game starter in 2009 and back-up to Robert Griffin III in 2010 and 2011 — leads the nation in passing (378.9 yards per game), total offense (414.4 yards per game), is third in points responsible for per game (22.3) and sixth in pass efficiency with a QB rating of 166.6.
But here are a few things about Florence that you might not know, facts that are equally as impressive.
• In seven career road starts, Florence has posted five of the eight top passing yardage totals in Baylor history.
• Florence has thrown for 300 or more yards in six of seven games this season.
• This season alone, Florence has completed 16 passes of 40 yards or longer and seven passes of 50 yards or longer — 10 of those 23 bombs have gone for touchdowns.
• Florence was named a Davey O’Brien Award semifinalist and a Campbell Trophy (known as the “Academic Heisman”) finalist.
Second down
Now that you’ve seen all the gaudy statistics put up by the Bears’ offense this season, let’s look at a couple more.
Baylor has scored a whopping 14 touchdowns this season on drives that took a minute or less. The total balloons to 23 TDs when talking about drives that lasted two minutes or less. Although the Bears’ have been incredibly explosive on offense, there has been a chink in the armor and it didn’t take KU coach Charlie Weis long to discover it.
“They’re scoring 44 points a game and I don’t know how that could play to anyone’s advantage,” Weis said. “Scoring points is not the problem. The only reason they’ve lost games is turnovers. They won the first three games scoring a bunch of points, and then they lost the last four games. The two games that they only scored 21, they turned it over six times in one and four times in the other. So realistically, it wasn’t because anyone’s really shut them down, it’s because they’ve turned it over. If we’re going to have chance to win, we’re going to need turnovers.”
Baylor coach Art Briles is well aware of that make-or-break statistic and, so far, he’s been at a loss to figure it out.
“If I knew the answer, we’d certainly stop it,” Briles said. “I think it’s something our players are aware of. Sometimes you get caught in situations trying to extend the play and you get a little risky with the football. I think it’s just all situational and awareness.”
Third down
Although the Jayhawks have won just once this season and have not won a Big 12 game in their last 17 tries, Briles is not about to look at this week’s match-up as a gimme.
For starters, he remembers how this team had his Robert Griffin III-led squad on the ropes in the fourth quarter a year ago. Even more to the point, Briles has seen vast improvement in the Jayhawks this season.
“They’re a Big 12 football team, they’re a good football team,” he said. “They’ve got good people, good coaches, good schemes and they’re certainly capable of beating anybody on any day just like anybody else in this league.”
Punt
Baylor leads the all-time series between these two, 7-4, including a 5-0 mark in games played in Waco.
Baylor has won two straight games in the series, albeit in very different manners. Two years ago in Waco, the Bears rolled over the Jayhawks, 55-7, and the game was basically over by the time the second quarter ended.
A year ago, in Lawrence, Kansas led Baylor by 21 points late in the game but fell in overtime, as Baylor ripped off four straight touchdowns, including the first in overtime, and then held off KU’s attempt at a game-winning two-point conversion.
KU’s last win in the series came in 2007, when the Jayhawks drubbed the Bears, 58-10, in Lawrence.
Comments
MoralVictory 6 months, 3 weeks ago
Offense is our defense. We have to sustain long, productive drives or we will get torched.
If Baylor has had that many turnovers recently, then the law of averages says that it will start to balance out the last few games of the season.
This game rides on the shoulders of the offense.
KGphoto 6 months, 3 weeks ago
If the law of averages worked that way, we would all have exactly the same turnover ratio at the end of the season. +-Zero.
If the law of averages works that way, the Chiefs are about to go on a mind boggling streak of + turnovers to finish the season, and the Wildcats are just going to fall apart because they only have 1 turnover so far.
But I don't think it works that way. I think some teams just can't hang on to the ball for some reason, and some teams (K-State) are great at it.
If it weren't for Crist's frequent narcoleptic episodes (sorry Dayne) we would have an outstanding turnover ratio. I think we'll win that battle on Saturday and it will be a huge factor.
texashawk10 6 months, 3 weeks ago
KU can get all the turnovers they want but if they can't score off of those turnovers (KU's only scored 27 points off of 17 gained turnovers) then it doesn't matter because Baylor likely only needs to get to 20+ points to win.
austin5string 6 months, 3 weeks ago
I've got a bad feeling that Patmon is gonna get scorched - he's been burned a lot lately, and this weekend could be brutal..
roundrockjhawk 6 months, 3 weeks ago
This isn't a feeling. It's a fact. What's worse is all his trash talking.
jayhawkintx1973 6 months, 3 weeks ago
This is ironic. Wasn't Pattmon the one with the pick six against NIU that extended the lead to 2 possessions?
He's been in a lot of pass break ups. He's certainly better than a year ago.
I do remember Aqib Talib giving up a long play to K-State in Manhattan in 2007 though. Do you remember that? I do.
beware0fph0g 6 months, 3 weeks ago
I remember it fondly. Twas Jordy Nelson that did the smoking that time.
jayhawkkufan2 6 months, 3 weeks ago
Agree he's gotten burned on a few big plays that hurt us bad, especially K-state and TX. Of course, K-State, other than Heeney, D was just awful in every position all game, as was special teams. Offense was good for the 1st half, then non-existent in the 2nd half. Truth is, same thing happened in the TX game 2nd half with the offense. We fade. And our D isn't good enough for our offense to not score points in the 2nd half. This is the Big 12, you have to score points to win games. Baylor has one of the top offenses, so D will most likely get burned here and there-- that's a fact. Offense must score if we have any chance. There is no good reason to not score a lot of points against Baylor's awful D. But quick newsflash if you watch explosive offenses each weekend, corners get burned on occasion. Plain and simple, especially if the QB has all day. All in all, for KU I think the secondary has played decent for the most part this year. Campo has stepped it up. Definitely improved from last year. I thought Pattmon has looked decent most of the season. Had a great game vs. OK st. and NIU. Dude has pass breakups for almost every game and a couple of INTs and a TD. Decent tackler. Just looked at the stats on the KU site and he's listed as 4th or 5th leading tackler. Hopefully he'll keep learning the corner position. Still think he played nickel the last couple of years better than true corner. He's definitely got some work to do. Going to hurt to lose Brown next year. Shepard shows some promise though.
plasticJHawk 6 months, 3 weeks ago
This game will definitely be a test of our defense. Against OU and KSU and even OSU we showed a tendancy to be vulnerable to big plays. Teams don't seem to fair as well against our defense in sustaining long drives and driving the ball through the red zone. It'd be interesting to know at least since conference season started how many TD's we have given up greater than 20 yards and how many less than 20 yards.
Baylor is a big play team so we'll see if we can stop them from making big plays. I've not got as good a feeling as I did last week against UT.
jayhawkintx1973 6 months, 3 weeks ago
Baylor's defense itself is pretty porous. They did give up 42 to TCU with their 2nd string WB in Waco and 70 to WV. WV hasn't sustained that attack either. With that said, they can score quick, but they can't score often if we keep the ball out of their hands.
Play calling is going to be crucial. Cummings needs to be put where he can succeed, not those deep passes 20 yards or deeper, but anything less than 10 yards if they are quick routes that he can get the ball out quick. We are going to have to pass it more this week. We can't afford to have 3 or 4 3 and outs in a row in this game.
I think our defense can cause some Turnovers. It appears that Operum and Love will both be playing this week, so that's a plus. Jacorey Sheperd is probably the biggest question mark because of his lack of experience at CB and he'll probably be used more because of his speed.
KGphoto 6 months, 3 weeks ago
Baylor has not shown the ability to stop the run. We should be able to do the same thing to them, as we did to Texas with the run game.
If they score a quick TD on a bomb. We grind out a long drive, making sure we score. They maybe they score another quick one. We grind it out.
Theeennnnn. We grab a TURNOVER, grind it out and score. Baylor TD... grind it.. turnover... grind it. You get the idea. I really think we can win the turnover battle with our new offensive scheme. That, and the ability to grind will keep this close, and could give KU an improbable win. But we HAVE to eliminate our own silly red-zone and kick return errors. i.e. Bourbon's fumble (recovered), McDougald's fumble (lost) and the high snap (recovered but ruined the scoring opportunity) vs. Texas.
texashawk10 6 months, 3 weeks ago
Baylor hasn't stopped anything this year. They're currently about as bad as KU's was last year and possibly worse than that defense. Baylor's defense is currently giving one less point per game than KU's did last year, but they are also giving up 37 more yards per game than KU's defense gave up last year.
KGphoto 6 months, 3 weeks ago
Ouch.
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