SLATE: Riley’s group continues to be the talk of the town

Football

Fall camp continued this week for Kansas State football, with a little over week now complete, and this week gave us both our first press conference with head coach Chris Klieman, as well as the first talk with the offensive coaching staff.

Klieman is excited about his group, both on and off the field, and feels that they have opened camp positively, and the guys are getting up to speed quickly. There are still position battles (like at safety), but even at established positions, Klieman says that strong depth is being built, and that’s not something he could always say the last few years.

One of those depth-building positions is running back, where Deuce Vaughn is the unquestioned starter. But the role of his backup for this season (and possible starter for next season) is a pretty hotly contested battle with no shortage of options (despite all the defections). The top two in contention are D.J. Giddens, the RS-Freshman from Junction City, and Anthony Frias, who committed to K-State this summer as a JUCO transfer. But don’t discount walk-ons Jordan Schippers (who logged carries at Western Illinois two years ago and at K-State last season) and La’James White (who went to the Air Force Academy out of high school, but elected to walk-on at K-State to get closer to his home in KC this offseason and participated in spring practices). It will be fun to see who emerges from that group behind Deuce.

And a position that has both starting battles and depth battles is the offensive line. So much so, that I almost gave you a click-bait headline this morning: “Does K-State have an o-line problem?” Yeah, Conor Riley has a problem. He’s got 8-10 guys that could start right now, and only 5 spots to fill. Three of those spots are locked in with Cooper Beebe on the left (though at guard or tackle is still to be decided), and Christian Duffie (RT) and Taylor Poitier (RG) on the right, but there is still questions on the left side and at center, but the answers are all good options, and Riley’s crew is again going to be one of the best overall units on the team. We’ll break it all down for you when we get to our offensive line preview in the next couple weeks!

Soccer

K-State soccer’s trip to Wyoming didn’t go quite as planned, as the Wildcats dropped a 2-1 decision to the host Cowgirls in Laramie. The Cats fell behind 1-0 after a Wyoming goal in the 12th minute, but freshman Andra Mohler finally scored the un-assisted answer for the Cats with a shot in the 65th minute (about half-way through the second half, to save you some counting). But the tie didn’t last long, and just a minute later the Cowgirls scored again to re-take the lead. Despite the loss, head coach Mike Dibbini is happy with where his team is at headed into the season in terms of the roster, but says they need to work better as a team for longer periods of the game.

K-State returns to action for their first regular season game of the year on Thursday, August 18th as the Cats host Northwestern to open the season. The home opener, along with all 10 K-State home contests, will be available on Big 12 Now on ESPN+. Selected road contests will also be available depending on the hosts’ setup.