No. 18 Kansas State 41, UT-Martin 6 | Postgame Podcast

welcome to the powercat podcast the original Kate Sports show now let's go to The Rolling Flint Hills Home of the cats and dogs Studio here's your host Tim Fitzgerald welcome to the powercat postgame podcast Fitz and Cole Cary right here in the cats and dogs studio with two dogs were asleep I think hopefully they stay that way Kansas State wins for 41-6 season opener against UT Martin it wasn't always pretty but they turned it on when they needed to we saw some real signs of uh possibility for this team and maybe some signs of they're not where they need to be offensively let's just dive in Cole the first half offense sucked yeah it I I that's a great way of putting it um it felt very vanilla we were trying to make comparisons to ice cream in the in the Press Box as to if there was a flavor that was less flavorful than vanilla that's probably what the offense would have been I mean the only thing I could think of is it tasted like just whipped cream I well I like whipped cream yeah that's a whole different topic hey uh I think uh the Newbie Lance had a good description it was boiled chicken it had no flavor it I don't want to insult vanilla by describing it that way I knew they were going to be conservative I knew they'd kind of do what they did in the bowl game game but dude that was much more conservative than I expected it it felt like a practice like that's honestly what it kind of felt like they had their script they were going to run a series of five or six plays and they were going to go out there and that was going to be their script and we're going to run inside Zone we're going to run outside Zone we're going to run a few you know flood Concepts we're going to run some hitches for those of you who maybe aren't as familiar with football terminology basically every play that you can run in a foot video game is I think what they ran it was it was very basic but I think that was also with a purpose because they didn't want to have to overwhelm Avery Johnson they didn't want to have to overwhelm Dylan Edwards they didn't want to have to overwhelm these guys because for as calm and stoic as all of these guys may appear there that's a lot to take in when you run out there in front of a soldout crowd in front of all of these legends that are back the golden cats the Hall of Fame indues that's a that's a lot to take in and so I think maybe some of that was intentional not to save plays necessarily but just to get those guys in a rhythm it was frustrating to watch they are being very protective of Avery Johnson not in because they're not letting him run plays they don't want him to get hurt and I think too protective so Avery comes in postgame he was really good he always is um I asked him about his first he only had three carries yeah and the the first two of those carries were flushes mhm we picked up a first down and one and I back came the other one was long night finally they had a designed quarterback run in the second half picked up some yardage got hit and he said I I felt like I was in the game then they got to let this kid run yeah I know they don't want him hurt but that is such an important part of his game he's got to get into the rhythm of the game you've got to run him that's part of his game I mean that's that's why he was so effective in the entire season last year was because of his running ability and the weapon to be able to just get out of the pocket whenever you want I mean that's what I was most impressed with on that 16 yard scramble today I mean he literally there was nobody open they were playing a zone defense and he was just like all right nobody's over here I'm just going to step up in the pocket run get 15 yards go half speed get out of bounds get the first down I mean you know very easily could have been a sack with however many of the previous quarterbacks that Chris kman has had um since I've been covering this team anyway but he just has a way to kind of escape the pocket but I mean you look at the stats on the knife hits he was 14 of 21 153 yards two touchdowns now obviously the interception is one that he would want back but besides the interception there wasn't any incompletions that I can remember that like oh that wasn't a very good pass oh there was one he second half he buried it in the ground about five yards short of the receiver looks like he just he must have been taking skill he must have been practicing with take onean Roberson because Roberson did the exact same thing yeah but I I thought you know for a first game I didn't think it was a bad performance by any stretch of the imagination you know you don't like to compare quarterbacks per se but you know I go look at what Jaylen Daniels did in a half against Lindenwood the numbers are very similar same close to the same amount of plays close to the same amount of yard close to the same amount of um passes completed so I don't think it was a bad day fight for Avery by any stretch of the imagination the interception wasn't great he he put the ball in the wrong spot that's gonna happen um a Johnson three carries for 37 yards I mean 12 yards a pop yeah you got to use that weapon a little bit Avery Johnson passing 14 of 21 one pick 153 yards a long completion of 44 with two touchdowns we don't even think the long completion was a completion we we have a photo that moved across one of the wire services does not look like Jace Brown had that ball going to the ground it looks like it's not in his hands all the way it's only cheating if you get caught I wondered why they rushed up yeah I'm glad to see them do that that must be Matt Wells thing because they haven't done that no other teams do that let's run to the line and before they can review it it's a good strategy now I mean um I thought that ball was perfectly placed by the way I mean he he he had to lead him because he wanted to score touchdown if you if you underthrow that ball the odds of it getting picked the odds of it being an incompletion you know very higher than if you try and lead him into the end zone I think jaay Brown slowed up a little bit at the end that's kind of why he had to dive if he keeps running that's a touchdown but Dylan Edwards found the endzone the next play and he deserved all of that because Dylan Edwards it was very obvious they wanted to get him the ball tonight and you look at the stats and DJs I mean unbelievable 13 carries 124 yards and it's like you know I thought DJ had a good night but he averaged 10 yards a rush he's so good man I mean it's just you just look down oh he's got 120 yards now I want people to understand this UT Martin's a pretty good FCS program they've been the best in the Ohio Valley Conference which is the second best conference for the most part um they wanted to stop the run the heart of their defense and as Chris kman said in the postgame that's a really good defensive front but they can compete they wanted to take the runway and they they committed to that and DJ giddens still runs for 124 yards didn't get in the end zone um Dylan Edwards had five carries for 43 yards but as a team their their rushing yarders was ridiculous for bur carry um and then of course Dylan Edwards also had uh the touchdown reception got to find him I don't have those two catches 19 yards and a touchdown and they used him punt returns um kick returns they shuffled some guys Jace Brown did one um I thought it was interesting oh gosh Lord uh they had locket out there quite a bit I'm too tired I can't remember he was name they perished back on they did on a punt which made me kind of think that that might just be they were playing defense and they sent a defensive back back there but I mean like we've talked about before Jacob was really good at that in high school yeah and that's an option back there especially if you think we're not sure this might be a fake well you can go put your playmaking cornerback there and sh of DJ Reed I mean that's what DJ did for so many years I really don't mind Defenders returning um because then they just walk off the field the offense takes over and you don't you know you got Dylan Edwards or Keegan Johnson back for kickoff do they stay in that next play I mean I don't mind it when Defenders return kicks but yeah um they they blocked a punt Cole um and it got a touchdown I'm telling you what I can already tell special teams are going to be better Ty Bowman in postgame oh my gosh I mean that guy if you want you want to talk about somebody who's serious about what he does he said he looked up to Brock Monty who if you remember Brock Monty another special teams guy at Kate Seth Porter same kind of guy he said I saw how much it meant to them and that's what I wanted to continue that tradition of and I'm sure he wants to play a receiver right that's what he is but he is owning that role and he is a stud I mean this guy is 6'4 he's fast he's strong he could probably play receiver at a lot of other places I mean guys like that that's what the transfer portal exists for if they want to go to the transfer portal and go play somewhere he can do that but he decided to stay at Kate and be a major contributor on this team and I mean he's already contributed for a touchdown so it's apparent that this I and I asked him I said how could this punt return being he's like we're going to surprise some people because he truly believes that between Sterling Lockett between Dylan Edwards and what they were able to do tonight it could be a really really underrated unit on this team because they had some good returns tonight too so when you're playing a game like this you're as we mentioned you're a little bit cautious to put what to put on film but sometimes you intentionally put some things on film I think they sent a message you better Max protect because we're coming that's going to be a problem because in you're kicking it downfield Max protecting against Dylan Edwards or Sterling Lockett return the ball it's shades of old K State you know they they avoided the punt return I think it was the first Punt and just gave K State yeah the ball at Midfield that's when your special teams are that intimidating it's really effective and I don't know how much of that had to do with that was what they wanted to do or just the punter maybe wasn't very good I think the UT Martin punter got better tonight because he was on the field so much um but you know you were talking about the rush I mean the pass rush is a major reason why that that blocked punt was a touchdown Fitz like I mean they were just in the back field every single play on defense and so when you're fourth and 12 and you're not getting any yards you have 88 yards going into half half time the odds of you punting from your own five are a lot greater than you punting from the opponent's 45 so I mean credit the defense for putting the Special Teams unit in that situation because um yeah like I mean I it just is amazing how how often UT Martin was behind the sticks tonight which resulted in those good returns and in that case of block bun yeah that it's interesting they play Simo this week they rival so once they fell behind they started putting in Subs just like K State um that's that was a pretty good team they really they were not bad at all uh let's flip it over now Cole and talk about the defense I said this in the postgame talk the power talk I think the defense is gonna be strength of this team dude they got after him that was impressive that so UT Martin ended up with uh where's the total yard here 134 yards total of 55 plays okay say it was 56 plays for 449 time a possession favored UT Martin I don't have the exact number but I know UT Martin had quite a bit of time of possession 3330 to case 2630 so so they spent half the game more than half the game to get 134 yards of offense and think about this okay this is where stats can get interesting so they had six more minutes of possession than K State did they ran one more play is that right 56 plays to 55 Kate ran 56 yeah so K State ran one more play had six minutes less of possession so a fairly even play total but I mean UT Martin had six more minutes of possession which just tells me they could not get anything going on offense and they didn't throw the ball a lot and the numbers will tell you that they threw the ball 17 times for 98 yards which means they wanted to establish the run and anytime you have more carries than yards rushing that's typically not a very good day 38 carries and 36 yards rushing an average of 9 rushing yards with a long of 11 yeah um 134 yards of offense and 45 of it came on one pass yeah 89 yards on the other 54 plays that's insane um but the pass rush was unbelievable it's just unbelievable what the pass rush did I don't think the sack numbers did it justice there was four um sacks on the night Cam Salis came and had one at the end of the game tobios andami had one and a half and they credited bryndan M with a half a sack I probably would have gave that a full sack to Toby um I thought he had two full sacks I didn't think anyone else helped him out they gave it to to M on the half a sack but I don't know if you can find QB pressures if that's a stat in college I know it is in the NFL but I want to say Toby had probably two more um he was I mean electric he was what a we talked about this again what a great role yeah well so what are what are you doing well I come in on a pass rush situations and sick quarterback yeah where I don't see my defensive stats in here where are they where are they well the thing about Toby is that translates no matter who Kansas State plays having that kind of weapon because that's what it is it is a weapon having that kind of weapon able to come in Off the Bench I mean it's it's hard to relate it to anything in sports the only thing that you can like even somewhat compare it to is like a sharpshooter off of your bench right in basketball who you just know is going to come in the game and he's going to hit a big time three-pointer everybody knows he's in the game to shoot a three and he's still going to make it that's what Toby does he comes on the field on third down all right try and block me good luck and they couldn't I mean they just simply couldn't block him one of my buddies Scott Reynolds who uh is in this industry too he covers Tampa Bay Buccaneers with um magazine website thing um texts me goes that shoulder dip he just did looked like Derek Thomas yeah it did he got low dipped his shoulder got past a tackle before you knew that quarterback was scared as hell of him there should have been another sack the quarterback just literally found a way to throw it away he just threw it up basically he was not going to take the sack he would rather have the interception at that point um just he reminded me of Tom B Ali Fitz like the way Tom B Ali used to bend that edge for the Chiefs I mean that's exactly what it was like watching Toby tonight but I mean not just him I thought Travis Bates Travis Bates announced as a starter pregame in front of sold out Bill snd Family Stadium I'm going Travis Bates He's listed as a two on the depth chart starts plays a lot and was really efficient yeah he's good yeah I couldn't figure out why they brought him in with so many good young defensive ends we saw why um so the depth chart I mentioned this on the power talk I thought this was interesting I don't know if you caught this the dep chart released this week had three defensive end spots and a defensive tackle the flip card today at the game had two defensive ends a defensive tackle which is Travis Bates and who else Chey was the other one that doesn't seem maybe and uh and they finally put nose tackle for their defense tackles so they kind of adjusted that I I'm wonder if that was kind of gamesmanship right they didn't want them know they're going to use a fourman front on occasion um but they just go so deep up there he just so many guys we saw cheaty just running down the quarterback that dude's so good he's huge to me one of my favorite plays of the game that probably went unnoticed is UT Martin tried to run an end round and Chey was the last guy on the end thank you Dey he was the last guy on the end and he closed down space did exactly what he was supposed to do here comes the end around well there's a puller and he takes on the puller the guy is engaged with him he gets rid of the blocker and what does he do he makes the tackle like that is a freshman who 65 275 pounds who just threw an offensive tackle and tackled a receiver in space that is very hard to do y and that kid has incredible potential but we've talked about Toby we've talked about cheaty but Desmond Pernell I mean this kid he's unbelievable here the MVP of the defense he is unb un believable like I he's gotten so good I I specifically remember two years ago when we're sitting in the Press Box Iowa State and khed Duke gets hurt and this is at a point in the season in that big 12 Championship season where they really needed him and he had been coming back from that knee injury and he'd been playing well and in the first quarter he gets hurt and here comes Desmond Pernell trotten out onto the field as the backup and we're sitting up there going this kid's hardly played he's a red Shir freshman is he even going to be ready for this moment and he developed that year he became a solidified starter last year and he has developed into an all Big 12 first team conference linebacker this year that was I mean some of the tackles he made is just other linebackers just don't make those tackles he's just fast violent efficient he understands the position so well now where he's got to be in what to do doesn't make many mistakes I didn't notice any I'm sure the coaches can find him on uh he's he's turning into one of the great linebackers and knowing the history of the linebackers at this school that says a lot again my buddy Scott texted me and said he reminds me of a bigger Josh bule way he's running around and chasing people down I'm like yeah you know Josh bule was undersized Dez is filled out quite a bit he looks the part he plays the part as coach kimman mentioned on uh Monday in some of their pass rush packages he's now playing the middle linebacker they're using him they can't take him off the field I dude the best players on this team are Kansas kids isn't it amazing I mean I'm gonna say Damen alalo too fits I mean that guy was disrupting the game from the moment it started and we can sit here and talk about how cool it is that there's 25 Kansas kids that are on the depth chart and how how great of an accomplishment that is but you're right literally the best ones are from Kansas literally the best kids on the team y the best players your quarterback your line your stud linebacker your all three interior offensive linemen are from Kansas your two running backs your two running backs are from from Kansas that's crazy man your tight end your tight ends are from Nebraska which is insane like both of them are three all three are from Nebraska tight end's a deep spot yeah said Bren Lofton we've been hearing about him holy crap he looked the role got his first career touchdown if you had Braden Lofton scoring the first touchdown for the season of cas8 I congratulate you uh I need some Financial advice yeah but it a great that was one of the few times they opened up the Playbook and ran something um I would like to point out now as we give a dog update dapy has just jumped up in her chair next to Cole which is something she doesn't normally do that's a rarity she's also watching this Arizona New Mexico game 55 to 31 as we record is the first dog we've had that watches TV I've seen other dogs that do it but I've never had one she just sits there and watches TV with you it's very strange um yeah this I almost feel good about this game because it wasn't perfect it wasn't the complete Annihilation blowout because they did win by 35 sorry if you bet gay state was 37 and a half was the spread um without showing a ton and I don't think they really did anything fancy on defense either they just were so dominant up two Lane's going to be interesting Road game second week of the season I I think the memory of two years ago losing to them at home is going to be fresh they can't commit the same mistakes they can't get so conservative they got to go down there and play they just gotta go play Cole and tan is a good football team like I know they have a new coach and it admittedly it's really hard to look at the Green Wave after they just won 52 to nothing um to me I almost think that's a detriment to that team because you're not getting ready you know and and and I had kind of told some people this but South Eastern Louisiana that that school is comparable to the lower divisions of the FCS I mean this very low compared to who Kansas State faced tonight in in UT Martin UT Martin are not equal right like we don't want to make it seem like that um but anytime you can score that many points it's you know it's impressive nonetheless I I'm interested to see what happens I'm interested to see what that environment's like is there going to be any kind of any kind of home crowd Advantage for two lane I don't know um but this just seems like a group fits that you don't want to doubt them because you could tell that they came out from halftime and and they had a chip on their shoulder they executed even after fumbling the opening kickoff they completely dominated the second half never in question the minute that the defense held UT Martin to a field goal you're like H okay this is going to be a blowout not that the game was won I think the game was won after that punt block but it was going to be a blowout once they held into a field goal which is I'm honestly surprised that the coach for UT Martin didn't try and score a touchdown there because oh that was weird it felt like that was a touchdown or bust moment for them but nonetheless he kicks the field goal and gay State answers with the field goal and then after that had six points inste three yeah I mean touchdown there might change the momentum he like calling timeout so I'll give him credit he used every single timeout I don't I don't know if I've seen that in a blowout game where a coach uses all six timeouts he ran out of timeouts in the first half about halfway through the second quarter stepy just realized right there now de is staring at Cole very strange um what am I missing here I feel like there's another big topic that we need to talk about um I wasn't Blown Away by the receivers yeah I wasn't I was disappointed what I saw from some of those guys they got to be better man they they they can't get by with the mediocre room and I think they've got the talent but Dante cus isn't ready to play he's just not he didn't look settled in at all will you play TR Trace spy he looked good two catches 26 yards I mean I think that might end up being your rotation is Jace Brown Trey spy and Keegan Johnson and I know Keegan Johnson only had one catch for six yards but he did have a rush he wasn't in the game as much as um jce Brown was I think it's pretty obvious Jay Brown's the number one receiver on this team which I don't think is a bad thing um that kid can ball so um he's going to be your your big down the field heavy hitter you're looking for that other outside receiver that can go create plays down the field I think Keegan Johnson will be kind of that middle guy we'll see if he develops into that but it's hard Fitz when you throw the ball only throw the ball 25 times it's really hard to do that especially when you're not really throwing the ball to make big plays ke State really didn't need to make big plays and then it's also really hard when Jace Brown catches five pass um your running backs catch another five passes so that's 10 of your 16 completions are to Jace Brown and your two running backs so that leaves six C six catches to go around and this is the problem that when we did our over unders at go power cat we're like this person's gonna have this many yards this many yards this many yards it's like well they can do that but that would mean somebody else isn't getting the I found myself doing that if he goes over how's he going AG go yeah this doesn't make sense to me um you know what I should have mentioned this up front if you're watching this or listening to this we're we're having a special go powercat right now to celebrate kickoff of football season 75% off it ends I believe Monday night little confusion on on that but I think it's in it's Monday night if you've been thinking about getting a subscription please do uh I think you'll enjoy our community our message board is a very for the most part tame I mean there's good discussions but with respect for the most part and uh it's yeah it's entertaining over there it's good it's healthy sometimes I feel like message boards are fans destroying each other and it just doesn't seem right to me to do that um but I I really appreciate our many subscribers who contribute to the message board but um if you're not subscribing time to do it right now soon as you're done with this oh actually we'll just wait just go and subscribe right now okay thank you uh but yeah get that taken care appreciate it very much um off to Tain gills and I will be heading down um I I feel like he could get arrested are you g to go visit the inspiration for Toby ozen Sami sack oh my gosh that's I'm so glad you brought that up so he does this like frozen running man thing I don't know what I had no idea what he was doing I'm like and when he did it okay so he had two sack celebration he did it I'm like why does that look familiar what is he doing what is this well in the post came he told us it was a guy on Bourbon Street with the Sugar Bowl that literally stood that way and I I I just blured out I saw him too that's where it was there was this guy painted all gold he was gold he was like it was that's what he does it's so worst he's got to do stop doing that it doesn't work man it was funny I think it was funny I'm sure that he'll get some trouble if he continues to do that he held it for a long time he did I was like is he okay and then Uso came by and smacked him on the head and then he was like oh I better get going yep yep um young town on that defense side the ball is impressive it's going to be fun they're all young by they're all young by the way I don't I don't know what the stats are but Jordan Riley was disrupted yes he I don't think the stats give him credit no he was three tackles but he was all over the place BJ Payne Jordan Riley and Marcus seagull Maris seagull um that might be the best Trio of safeties that they've had and do you realize how absurd that statement is yeah yeah I'm g a player player that I really enjoyed who I didn't want to transfer transferred at safety and they upgraded yeah yeah they they do a great job recruiting if all my life decisions were as good as uh Chris kimman and Joe clander picking safeties I would be never make mistakes because it's crazy when they go get a transfer safety yeah he's GNA be good 100% 100% anything else 41 to6 I feel like we should say more but I don't know what to say and it's a push it's past 1: a.m for it's a ho hum effort it's just again I I just go back to it you don't think it's a very good game they didn't give up a touchdown and I'll I'll riddle you this I saw this Fitz and and we'll we'll close with this since we're talking about the defense so much there's only there's only what did they say three teams that have had four or more shutouts since 2022 would you like to guess who those teams are my brain doesn't work right now well I don't know one of the teams because I forgot but one of the other teams is Iowa who everybody talks about all the time how good their defense is and the other team's K State only the difference between Iowa and K State is one team actually plays offense I know now credit Iowa they scored 40 points today but K State scored 41 so what do we say interesting first week of Big 12 action in fact we still got big 12 action here in the studio at 1:00 am uh we've got the Arizona game up they're you're going to score a million points um I don't even know what the Arizona State game's doing right now it was like 45 to nothing good good for them good for them some yeah well that's it for this podcast we back course with fresh content and next week probably we have the Insiders we have a real scheduling problem with the Insiders let's put it that way we don't know where to put it Mondays are total chaos now with the press conferences there um we'll figure it out or maybe we won't maybe we'll just say it didn't work Glen Kenley getting selfish and looking out for his own career and leaving it just was might have been the final nail in trying to do The Insider oh we love Glenn Glenn uh Glenn went home he's from Illinois and he's going to be covering Brad Underwood and Brett BMA Dana demel's up there now that's right and my buddy Kent Brown who was Kenny Leno's predecessor as the Sid here is their uh Deputy ad for communications so a lot of Kate connections up there that's it for this edition of the powercat postgame podcast sometimes it'll be me I think next week it might be Cole and Big B doing this thing um because they can just set it up and go and we'll be in New Orleans and uh who knows what we'll be doing I don't want to discuss it my wife watches this that's it thank you for watching I better better run the end podcast folks I'm tired I'm gonna I'm going to push the button here in this show uh and go to bed but I have to post it too damn it have a good night this has been a gopowercat.com and spirit Street production please support this show by subscribing to this YouTube channel or follow us on your favorite podcast platform