Kansas will look to get back on the winning track and earn its first victory in Big 12 Conference play when it hosts Houston on Saturday afternoon in a league clash at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, Mo.
The Jayhawks (1-5, 0-3 Big 12) come in following an open week after dropping five straight outings. Kansas’ most recent game was a 35-31 defeat at Arizona State in which the Jayhawks surrendered the deciding touchdown pass with 16 seconds remaining. Jalon Daniels passed for 260 yards and two scores in the loss.
The defeat marked the fourth time in the skid that the Jayhawks lost by six points or fewer. Kansas has not won since beating FCS opponent Lindenwood on Aug. 29.
The Jayhawks have been hit with a slew of injuries, especially on the defensive side, and the open week didn’t get their players as healthy as coach Lance Leipold would have liked.
“We’ve still got a lot of guys who are questionable,” Leipold said. “(We are) working through it, but we’ll have to see where (the week) takes us. A few guys are getting a little bit better.”
Kansas running back Devin Neal enters the Saturday game just 181 yards away from breaking the school’s all-time rushing record of 3,841 yards set by June Henley from 1993-96.
Houston (2-4, 1-2 Big 12) heads north after an open week that came after a stunning 30-19 win at TCU on Oct. 4. Zeon Chriss threw for a touchdown and ran 97 yards for another score in his first career start while directing a Houston offense that amassed 361 total yards and held the ball for almost 37 minutes.
The victory snapped a two-game losing streak in which the Cougars were held scoreless.
Chriss, who has been splitting playing time at quarterback with veteran Donovan Smith, was named the team’s starter on Monday by Houston coach Willie Fritz.
“There’s a lot of positives to take from the TCU game, but we can obviously get a lot better,” Fritz said. “We got to continue to keep doing a super job with ball security and winning the turnover/takeaway margin — we were plus-4 in the last game.”
The teams will meet for the first time as Big 12 foes, with Kansas owning a 4-0 advantage in the all-time series. The most recent matchup was a 48-30 Jayhawks win at Houston in 2022 in which Daniels accounted for five touchdowns (three passing, two rushing).
