Kansas State gets first 2018 basketball commit

We have now reached the point where most of you only get two more paychecks before football begins. It’s so close I could taste it if my mouth weren’t full of buttery cinnamon.

You know it’s getting close, because the preseason Amway Coaches Poll is out. AMS brought you the news yesterday: the Cats are ranked 19th. It’s the highest pre-season ranking for K-State since 2004, which you’ll remember as “the season after Darren Sproles murdered Oklahoma”.

Meanwhile, at the Dallas Morning News, Chuck Carlton thinks the Big 12 got snubbed in the poll despite getting five teams in the top 25. The Columbus (Miss.) Dispatch broke down the top 25 and made note of the Big 12 getting love, which just shows people have different perceptions. Of course, the uncredited writer of the article also thought K-State was due to regress this year, which just shows some people are ignorant.

Yesterday was media day at Vanier, and the official site has many of the best details. Bill Snyder, his coordinators, and several players talked to the assembled inkheads, and a few noteworthy items actually emerged:

• Snyder is openly impressed with Trent Tanking and his move into the leadership role among the linebackers, a good sign for a decimated unit.
• Dana Dimel says Dalvin Warmack is having a very good camp, meaning he’s going to have lots of options in the ground game.
• Alex Barnes revealed that Jesse Ertz and the receivers have been putting in a ton of off-practice work to build chemistry.
• Bill Snyder isn’t drinking coffee anymore. (Kevin Haskin, Capital-Journal)
• Will Geary is a man on a mission. (Ken Corbitt, Capital-Journal)

At Hero Sports, Andrew Doughty ranks the five toughest three-game stretches in the Big 12 this year. K-State does not make the list themselves, but they’re partially responsible for four of the five teams that did. The fifth? Kansas, who will spend three weeks in the middle of November visiting an angry Texas, hosting Oklahoma, and traveling to Oklahoma State. Of course, one could argue Texas should have been number one, as they pull three weeks against K-State and the two Oklahoma schools... but they play all three games in the Lone Star State, so it’s not quite so frightening.

At Big 12 Media Days, Iowa State coach Matt Campbell talked about Joel Lanning’s move to linebacker. Yesterday, Randy Peterson of the Des Moines Register reported Lanning’s still going to see action on offense. A two-way player! Yay!

Matt Brown — the Sports on Earth Matt Brown, not my sort-of boss Matt Brown -- offers his All-Underrated team for this year. The offensive line? Well, it’s... K-State. No, really, the entire K-State offensive line.

We wrap up today’s football news with this bit from Dave Bryan at Steelers Depot. ESPN named some of their 2017 NFL breakout player candidates, and one stands out to us: one Benjamin J. Finney.

Basketball

There’s actually a lot of football news in Kellis Robinett’s mailbag from yesterday (including the fact that Daniel Green has disappeared from the roster), but the focus is on Robinett’s dissection of the meaninglessness of Bruce Weber’s contract extension.

Of course, that extension may have already paid a dividend. Weber landed the first member of his 2018 recruiting class last night as Hazelwood Central point guard Shaun Williams offered his commitment to the Wildcats. The 6’2” Williams is the third St. Louis-area recruit in three years. Robinett notes that K-State doesn’t actually have an open scholarship in 2018 right now, but I think we all know that doesn’t really matter. Someone will “decide” to transfer.

Volleyball

Yesterday JT reported that Bryna Vogel was named pre-season All-Big 12; after that report, the conference announced the results of its preseason poll. Texas was first and Kansas second, followed by Baylor and Iowa State in a near-dead heat for third and fourth. K-State checked in fifth, a decent margin behind those two but well ahead of sixth-place West Virginia.

If fifth place seems disappointing, remember that last year’s NCAA team was hit pretty hard by graduation.

Soccer

ALERT: If you were planning on attending the Purple-White Scrimmage on Saturday evening, you’d better make some hurried alterations to your plans. Because of expected inclement weather on Saturday, the scrimmage has been moved up to tonight at 7pm. That’s bad news for anyone who’d been planning to travel, but it is what it is.