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K-State Slate: 8.31.14 - Felling the Lumberjacks

We're going to do the whole Sunday morning quarterback thing.

Yay! New pictures!
Yay! New pictures!
Scott Sewell-USA TODAY Sports

That's one game in the bag, and all things considered, a 55-16 win over Stephen F. Austin is a good win for the Wildcats.

Without further ado, let's get to the inevitable post-game recapping, analysis, hand-wringing and the seasonal arrival of unreasonable expectation

Here is a list of game recaps and notes from various sources, listed in no particular order: Recaps from ESPN, Boxscore, the Topeka Capital-Journal, the Kansas City Star, Kansas.com, the Collegian, and last but definitely not least, Jon Morse from the Granfalloon.

A number of new players stepped up in yesterday's game, including wide receiver Kody Cook and linebacker Elijah Lee. I think I'm not alone in admitting that my thoughts yesterday were mostly along the lines of "who are these people?"

Kevin Haskin writes that the game was much less vanilla than most season openers under Bill Snyder. This was probably a predictable downstream consequence of last year's loss to North Dakota State, which may have done more good than harm in the long run.

Haskin also notes that Tyler Lockett was practically a no-show for the game, although post-game comments from Lockett and from Bill Snyder suggest this was by design. It's probably a good idea to protect your biggest offensive weapon as much as possible.

The ESPN(blog) crew gives out Big 12 helmet stickers. Predictably, Jake Waters' performance (223 yds passing, 19-of-28, 2 TD; 55 yds rushing; 2 TD) got the nod for K-State. As noted in the story, Waters was particularly impressive in distributing the ball. Is this the most competent passing offense we've had since the Chad May days? Discuss.

The Collegian grades the game. I'm sort of surprised they gave the special teams an A, considering Jack Cantele and the missed field goal in a relatively low pressure situation. On the other hand, there was this quote from Stephen F. Austin's coach, Clint Conque:

I never saw their punter, but I’m sure he’s a nice young man.

The K-State running backs worked well together. At first, I thought the "compliment" in the headline was a typo for "complement," but it turns out the running backs actually complimented each other. #FAMILY and all that.

The national picture unfolded in an interesting way this past weekend. Every team in the country looked vulnerable on a weekend when #1 Florida State narrowly escaped Oklahoma State, Ohio State almost got shipped off by Navy, LSU needed a furious comeback to stave off Wisconsin, and West Virginia managed to go toe-to-toe with Alabama.

Spencer Hall has this playoff threat watch, and fails to mention K-State altogether. DISRESPECT!

Oh, and North Dakota State won their fifth straight game against an FBS opponent. I think we should all collectively agree to never schedule them again. Sheesh.

Unfortunately, the VolleyCats could not duplicate the football team's success and were swept by Arizona to end their season-opening tournament.

Phew! That took forever. What the heck did I sign up for?