Waco, Texas — The recipe for success for the Kansas defense during the Jayhawks’ impressive late-season run was holding firm in the red zone and forcing the occasional turnover on downs, like early in KU’s win over Colorado, or well-timed interception, like before the half against BYU.
That recipe turned rotten on Saturday afternoon at Baylor, when the Jayhawks had no answer for any facet of the Bears’ offensive attack.
BU quarterback Sawyer Robertson threw for four touchdowns with Monaray Baldwin and Josh Cameron clearing the 100-yard threshold, running backs Bryson Washington and Dawson Pendergrass combined for 296 yards, and the Bears dealt KU its worst loss in more than two years, in a game that resembled many of the Jayhawks’ pre-Lance Leipold visits to McLane Stadium.
“We ran into a very physical football team that played downhill and aggressively all day,” the KU coach Leipold said postgame. “We missed more than our share of tackles, I think we got caught catching a few times, and like we say, not playing downhill. We got hit on a couple big passes, they made some nice plays, they got on a roll and we didn’t answer it real well.’
KU lost to the Bears for the 14th straight time and was unable to reach the six-win threshold that guarantees bowl eligibility, bringing its season to an end as a sufficient number of other schools reached six wins on Saturday.
“Four straight games against ranked teams, I think, finally took its toll a little bit,” Leipold said. “That’s on me to make sure we’re trying to get ready.”
Added safety O.J. Burroughs: “Through the last three games we had some success. We just felt like we was going to come in here and just get the job done. They was more physical than us, they executed better than us and they got the win.”
After giving the ball away just once during its three-game run to put itself in postseason contention, KU committed three turnovers on Saturday, a pair of ill-advised interceptions by Jalon Daniels and a fumble by redshirt senior tight end Tevita Ahoafi-Noa on his first career catch.
“Today was kind of similar to how it went early in the season, where we’re just not clicking, really, in any part of the game,” senior running back Devin Neal said. “It’s really hard to beat a team, because if you really look at the stats it’s like, yeah, we had a decent day on offense — other than we turned the ball over, and you turn the ball over to any good team, they’re going to take advantage of that.”
Daniels finished 12-for-23 for 280 yards with the two interceptions and now faces a decision about whether he will return to KU for a sixth season of college football.
“I didn’t necessarily put my team in the best position to be able to win today,” Daniels said, “and that’s just something that I’m going to have to take to the chin, and I have to be able to get better from that.”
Neal ran for 133 yards, 77 yards of which and his lone touchdown came in the first quarter.
The Jayhawks got off to a fast start thanks to a penalty on Baylor on the kickoff, a jet sweep by Neal, and a no-huddle 33-yard completion from Daniels to Quentin Skinner.
However, Ahoafi-Noa, targeted for the second time in his career, couldn’t quite get his foot down on a near-touchdown on third-and-5 from Baylor’s 20-yard line, and Tabor Allen missed a 38-yard field goal.
“It really kind of takes the wind out of your sails, as you can expect,” Leipold said. “I think we received the opening kickoff about five straight weeks, and we’ve been able to go down and get points on the board and feel good about it and have a decent drive, and we stalled and we have a makeable field goal that we don’t connect on, and that’s disappointing.”
KU derailed the Bears’ opening drive with sacks by D.J. Withers and JB Brown, and Neal ran for 38 yards on third-and-inches to set up another scoring chance for the Jayhawks. He then strolled in for a 19-yard touchdown to give his team the first lead of the game. The referees threw a flag for holding but picked it up, allowing the score to count.
Baylor used a couple of catch-and-run plays from Robertson to Ashtyn Hawkins and Cameron to reach KU territory, then faced a third down on which Robertson lofted the ball to Baldwin, who burned Marvin Grant for a 36-yard score.
The Jayhawks’ offensive success encountered a significant setback when Daniels sailed a pass intended for Leyton Cure that was easily intercepted by Devyn Bobby. Pendergrass ran for 26 quick yards and then Baldwin zoomed past Grant again on a slot fade for a near-identical second touchdown.
“I feel like we kind of slept on them,” Burroughs said. “We got used to the success of the past few weeks, started slow and we got hit in the mouth early, so I felt like that’s where we went wrong at today.”
KU responded with a much more methodical drive, including a 13-yard run by Neal on third-and-7 and another long connection from Daniels to Skinner. Reprising some of their struggles into goal-to-go situations from the Colorado game, though, they gained two yards on three plays from the 10-yard line and settled for a short field goal to make it 14-10.
That proved inadequate because Baylor continued to gash the KU defense for 23 yards on a catch by Cameron and 25 yards on a run by Washington. Robertson threw his third touchdown of the first half — before throwing his first incompletion — to Cameron on an in-breaking route, as the wideout spun his way into the end zone past Mello Dotson.
The Jayhawks were poised to score before the half when Daniels found Ahoafi-Noa down the field, but 35 yards in, he got leveled by Tevin Williams III and fumbled.
“Any time we felt like we were getting back into momentum that was coming our way, we did something to self-destruct,” Leipold said.
Matt Jones recovered and Baylor managed to get to the edge of field goal range, but a last-second sack by Tommy Dunn forced a 53-yard attempt. Isaiah Hankins’ kick hit the left upright, meaning Baylor’s advantage stayed at 11 entering the break.
Halftime did little to improve KU’s prospects on defense, as the Bears shredded the Jayhawks on their opening drive with one play after another, leading to a 10-yard touchdown run by Washington that gave KU its biggest deficit since Sept. 30, 2023.
It got worse for the Jayhawks in short order after another three-and-out. Robertson got the ball out to Baldwin for a pair of first downs, then checked it down to Pendergrass, who made JB Brown miss and ran it in for another touchdown.
“I think we played on our heels a lot more today that we had in the last few weeks,” Leipold said. “Why, I don’t know. It was kind of like we’re waiting for things. If you watch anything that was perimeter-wise for us offensively, they had a lot of people swarming and stringing things out. We seemed to be waiting a lot more than we normally should and not triggering, and trying to go make some plays.”
The Jayhawks showed a bit of fight on offense, with Daniels hitting Luke Grimm for 48 yards on a trick play, setting up a reverse to Lawrence Arnold and a 14-yard score that made it 35-17.
KU had a chance at a stop after an illegal shift backed Baylor into third-and-7, but the Jayhawks allowed Robertson to scramble for a first down. On the next play, Washington surged up the middle for 50 yards, and he scored two plays later.
Daniels found Jared Casey and Grimm for huge gains, but then threw a second interception to Bobby. Hankins added his first successful field goal from 40 yards out.
“Today was kind of just a snowball effect of bad thing after bad thing,” Neal said.
With 38 players having gone through senior-day festivities, the Jayhawks’ roster will be near-unrecognizable when it opens its new-look stadium on Aug. 23 against Fresno State to begin the 2025 season.
How they scored
First quarter
5:18 — Devin Neal 19-yard run. Tabor Allen PAT good. Seven plays, 83 yards, 3:40 TOP. KU 7, BU 0.
2:51 — Monaray Baldwin 36-yard pass from Sawyer Robertson. Isaiah Hankins PAT good. Six plays, 75 yards, 2:27 TOP. KU 7, BU 7.
0:59 — Baldwin 39-yard pass from Robertson. Hankins PAT good. Two plays, 65 yards, 0:28 TOP. BU 14, KU 7.
Second quarter
9:16 — Allen 26-yard field goal. Fifteen plays, 67 yards, 4:37 TOP. BU 14, KU 10.
6:00 — Josh Cameron 14-yard pass from Sawyer Robertson. Hankins PAT good. Eight plays, 82 yards, 3:10 TOP. BU 21, KU 10.
Third quarter
10:58 — Bryson Washington 10-yard run. Hankins PAT good. Nine plays, 74 yards, 4:02 TOP. BU 28, KU 10.
6:25 — Dawson Pendergrass 20-yard pass from Robertson. Hankins PAT good. Seven plays, 62 yards, 3:17 TOP. BU 35, KU 10.
5:03 — Lawrence Arnold 14-yard run. Allen PAT good. Three plays, 75 yards, 1:22 TOP. BU 35, KU 17.
0:07 — Washington 1-yard run. Hankins PAT good. Nine plays, 74 yards, 4:56 TOP. BU 42, KU 17.
Fourth quarter
9:31 — Hankins 40-yard field goal. Eleven plays, 57 yards, 4:42 TOP. BU 45, KU 17.
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