Kansas State Football: Critiquing the 2008 Wildcats

That brings me to Reason No, 3—Kansas State’s 2008 schedule. After dropping Fresno State in lieu of Montana State, the Wildcats’ pre-conference schedule is weak at best (sans Louisville). In contrast to their pre-conference schedule, Kansas State’s tour of the Big 12 is a brutal gauntlet of games that any team in the conference would have a tough time with.

Road games at Texas A&M, Colorado, Kansas, and conference champions Missouri do not bode well for an undermanned Wildcat squad. In my idealistic world K-State will start 3-1 with their first loss coming at Louisville. After that it’s eight straight conference games that, in my opinion, the ‘Cats will be lucky to win two of.

I see K-State winning two games out of their three contests with Colorado, Kansas, and Iowa State. Either way, I have a real hard time seeing my beloved Wildcats escaping the 2008 season with more than five wins (and that comes from a perennial optimist—I predicted seven wins in 2007 and we ended up with what, five?!).

If the atmosphere and fans in Manhattan are ever to factor into the Wildcats' success, this is the year.  K-State will be more reliant than ever on their fans to help them get over the hill in close home games. The 'Cats should be able to steal one road game and if they can win three out of four at home, they will fare better than even I predict they will.

You can bet your life that I’ll be at every home game and at least one road game to cheer on my ‘Cats. I honestly think we can beat our hated rivals to the east—the Jayhawks—but this year will, sadly, not be a diversion from the last four. Yet rest assured Wildcat fans, come 2009 we should, in my opinion, either have a new head coach to guide us back to the glory and dominance we are accustomed to, or have faired well enough in '08 to warrant giving Ron Prince one more go at a winning season. 

Since I’m sure I’ve exceeded the attention span of just about everyone reading this article, I’ll save my in-depth critique of Kansas State’s offense and defense for another day. I’ll leave you with my prediction for the Kansas State University Wildcats football team of 2008: an optimistic 6-6 with wins over North Texas, Montana State, Louisiana-Lafayette, Colorado, Kansas, and Iowa State.

Only time will tell, but I'm afraid the Wildcat Nation will have to wait a bit longer for the Wildcats' return to dominance. 2008 will decide the fate of KSU football for at least half a decade to come, let's all hope for the best. But remember, no matter the outcome, every man a Wildcat!

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