It’s another for the players themselves to see that side of things.

That’s been the case for the 2022 Kansas Jayhawks, who will be making the first bowl appearance for the school in 14 years later this month at the Liberty Bowl in Memphis against Arkansas.

While the past couple of weeks since the Dec. 4 Liberty Bowl announcement have been spent on a number of more immediate things — from rest and recruiting to game planning and watching film — the Jayhawks have operated with an eye toward the future, as well.

That means extra reps for developing players, keeping an eye on the transfer portal’s comings and goings and understanding what playing in a bowl game again can me for the future of the program that made substantial progress in its rebuild by going 6-6 this season.

“It helps a ton with recruiting,” defensive lineman Sam Burt said of playing in a bowl game. “Getting a chance to play an SEC team and see how we stack up against them will be great for recruiting next year.”

How so?

Burt said by simply being in a bowl again Kansas football automatically becomes an extra conversation piece and gets great exposure nationwide.

Second-year Kansas coach began talking about the benefits of going bowling as soon as the Jayhawks became eligible to do so with a win over Oklahoma State on Nov. 5.

Like Burt, Leipold sees the benefit that being a bowl-bound can have in KU’s recruiting efforts. Their message to potential future Jayhawks is no longer just about selling the chance to play in the Big 12 or be a part of building something. Now, the Kansas coaching staff can talk about competing in the Big 12, playing in the postseason and having players and the program featured on ESPN’s College GameDay and in Heisman Trophy conversations.

“It’s going to be big for a lot of reasons,” Leipold said of getting KU back to a bowl game. “And it won’t even be seen completely this year or maybe even next year.”

Part of that idea is tied to the development of the next batch of Jayhawks, players who will be tasked with sustaining the success that this year’s first- and second-string players enjoyed.

“You start thinking about these practices and the extra retention and the extra time,” Leipold began. “I mean, our rules don’t even allow us — if we don’t make a bowl game — to put them back in the weight room. That’s a crazy rule to me.”

That’s also not something the Jayhawks have to worry about currently, and that shortens the length of the offseason considerably.

“We’ll be with our guys,” said Leipold, who has been in and out of Lawrence, working with the team and recruiting during the past couple of weeks. “Then we’ll go out in spring ball and the retention and understanding of things will continue to get better. The teams that have been able to stack that year in and year out (really benefit). That’s what I’m looking forward to.”

Added Kansas quarterback Jalon Daniels of that philosophy: “That’s where it really starts at.”

While that may be the starting point for taking full advantage of a month’s worth of extra practices, it certainly will not be all the Jayhawks focus on this month.

At some point, they’ll lock in fully on Arkansas and begin final preparations for the Liberty Bowl, which is slated to kick off at 4:30 p.m. Dec. 28 in Memphis.

Although its bowl history is somewhat limited, given the 133-year history of the program, Kansas has won five of its last six bowl games, with the most recent coming in 2008.

In order to best position themselves to extend that run to six of the last seven, Leipold gave his team one piece of advice early in the bowl preparation process.

“The most excited team is going to be the team that comes out victorious,” Daniels recalled his coach telling the team shortly after the bowl matchups were announced.

Being excited doesn’t sound like it will be much of a problem for the Jayhawks.

“Obviously, it’ll be a great challenge for us,” Burt said of facing the 6-6 Razorbacks. “They’re in a great conference, they’re a great team, very solid, and I’m very excited to play them and just see what happens.”