Pressure Looms on Kansas Coach Charlie Weis Going into Big 12 Play for 2014

The Kansas Jayhawks captured their second win of the season, improving to 2-1 on the season after picking up a 24-10 victory over Central Michigan. Kansas coach Charlie Weis earned his sixth win since taking the reins in Lawrence, passing Turner Gill for most career wins as the head coach of the Jayhawks.

It has not been a pretty two years at Kansas for Weis, who is getting ready for his third year to coach the Jayhawks in conference games after a 2-1 nonconference record for 2014.

Through Kansas’ nine nonconference games under Weis, the Jayhawks went 5-4, barely inching above .500. KU’s gone 1-17 through two years of Big 12 games as its only conference win came late in 2013 against West Virginia, a team which won only four games last year.

The Jayhawks begin conference play at home next week when the Texas Longhorns come to Memorial Stadium. Weis certainly wants to improve the team in many ways and has a chance to do that through the next nine games.

But it is easier said than done.

Weis has not shown any encouraging signs of moving Kansas in the right direction. In each of his two years with the Jayhawks, he’s changed quarterbacks midway through the season as the depth chart has gone through notable changes every single week.

Kansas has suffered 13 blowout losses under Weis as the program is seeking its first road win in more than five years, trying to snap a 25 road-game losing streak, excluding neutral-site games.

Weis is making $2.5 million per year at Kansas. It is no secret to anyone that $2.5 million is a lot for a coach who’s only won four games in two years. The response to that would be Weis has to dig the program out of Gill’s mess.

Here we are in the third year of the Weis era. Gill should be a long-distant memory at this point. For a coach earning $2.5 million annually, he should be good enough to dig a program out of the mess created by the previous regime.

Weis is on the hot seat right now. This is his make-or-break year. By guiding KU to .500 or above at the end of 2014, Weis will show he has made significant progress at Kansas.

If Kansas sees little improvement by the end of the season, athletic director Dr. Sheahon Zenger must pull the trigger and seek a new head coach for the program. If Weis struggles to make Kansas competitive, Zenger has to come to the understanding $7.5 million in three years is way too much for a coach who has underperformed.

Projections say Weis and his Jayhawks will finish in the basement of the Big 12 once again. There is no doubt Zenger is keeping a close eye on the football team’s progress. If he doesn’t see any, the discussions about Weis parting ways will begin and Zenger will need to seek a coach who can turn this program around.

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