clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

How to Watch: K-State football vs. Kansas

The Sunflower Showdown is also the Battle of the Big 12 Basement.

By AMS
TCU v Kansas Photo by Brian Davidson/Getty Images

The teams aren’t quite Toilet Bowl bad, but it has been a while since the teams in the football edition of the Sunflower Showdown have both been this inept at the same time.

The Game

The Kansas State Wildcats (3-6, 1-5 Big 12) welcome the Kansas Jayhawks (3-6, 1-5 Big 12) into Manhattan for the 116th Sunflower Showdown. The stakes are low, but the winner is still technically alive for bowl eligibility. The losing team will be staying home for the holidays. The series is the fourth-longest continuously played rivalry in FBS football, and the longest between Big 12 teams.

Previously

Both teams lost their games a week ago, with K-State losing a low-scoring affair with TCU, 14-13, and KU never reaching the end zone in a 27-3 loss to Iowa State before announcing head coach David Beaty would be fired at season’s end.

Kansas leads the Sunflower Showdown with 64 victories to 46 for K-State (with 5 ties), but the Wildcats have won the last nine meetings and 22 out of the last 27, going back to 1991. Bill Snyder is 22-4 against KU.

Kickoff

Kickoff is at 11 a.m. at Bill Snyder Family Stadium (official capacity 50,000) in chilly Manhattan, Kansas. As of Friday night, the forecast was for a high of 38 and south winds 15-20 mph.

Odds

Oddsmakers list K-State as 10.5-point favorites, with an over/under of 47. Those odds combine to suggest an expected score of approximately 29-18 or 28-18 in favor of K-State.

Video

Jeff Levering (play-by-play), Brian Baldinger (analyst), and Lesley McCaslin will call the game for Fox Sports Network.

Audio

Wyatt Thompson (play-by-play), Stan Weber (analyst), and Matt Walters (sidelines) will call the game for the K-State Sports Network on terrestrial radio, Sirius Channel 113, XM Channel 199, and the TuneIn app.

My Prediction

Bill Snyder gets his team fired up for the in-state rivalry, and K-State comes out on fire, lifted by reinvigorated special teams play. The offense cools off in the second half, but it’s enough for K-State to win, 35-7. On Tuesday, KU athletic director Jeff Long introduces Sean Snyder as KU’s next head coach.