Why Chris Klieman expects big things from K-State offense, even without Deuce Vaughn

Deuce Vaughn is gone. So is Malik Knowles. You won’t see Kade Warner in a Kansas State football uniform ever again, either. The Wildcats lost a tremendous amount of production (1,558 rushing yards, 1,559 receiving yards and 19 total touchdowns to be exact) when those three talented skill players bid farewell to college football and set their sights on the NFL at the conclusion of last season. Replacing them won’t be easy. And yet, K-State football coach Chris Klieman doesn’t seem worried. Not one bit. “I’m excited,” Klieman said this week at Big 12 Media Days at AT&T Stadium, “because I think we’ve barely scratched the surface of what we can do offensively.” The reason for Klieman’s confidence is easy to understand, even as the Wildcats look to fill the massive void left by an all-time great running back and their two leading receivers from 2022. Will Howard is back as the team’s starting quarterback. Collin Klein remains on staff as offensive coordinator. And Klieman recently signed a lucrative contract extension that will keep him at K-State for the long haul. Whenever a QB, an OC and a HC all stay together, big things usually happen. “That continuity is huge on the offensive side of the ball,” Klieman said. “Collin had his first year last year, and it was phenomenal. But I saw some innovation. I saw even more things in spring ball that they were able to do. When you have a guy like Will that is so smart I think that we’re going to be able to advance a lot of things that we’ve done and find new ways to get our guys the ball.” The Wildcats averaged 32.3 points and 418.8 yards per game with Klein calling plays from the press box last season. Perhaps the team’s biggest victory of the offseason was convincing him to stay in Manhattan despite Alabama, Notre Dame and Texas A&M all expressing interest in hiring him. It’s exciting to think about what plays will show up on his call sheet now that he is entering Year 2 on the job. “We did some really cool things and it was only our first year with him,” Howard said. “Now that we have another full year with him at the helm we can fix some things we got wrong last year. We had a really good year, but we went back and watched the film and realized there was a ton we needed to clean up. We’re going to keep raising the bar on what we can do.” Howard is so confident that he thinks K-State fans need to start raising their expectations for up-and-coming players like R.J Garcia and D.J. Giddens, as well as new transfers Keagan Johnson (Iowa) and Treshaun Ward (Florida State). He also thinks tight end Ben Sinnott and veteran receiver Phillip Brooks can have their best seasons. “We are tailoring our offense to what we have this year,” Howard said. “Every year, you’re going to have a different group of guys with different skill sets at every position. Obviously, for me being a more of a throw-heavy quarterback we were trying to push the ball down the field a lot last year. Now we’re doing some RPOs and doing a lot of different stuff. It’s going to be fun. I’m looking forward to kind of getting into camp and seeing what we’re able to do with it.” Offensive lineman Cooper Beebe went so far as to say that he thinks K-State took a “vanilla” approach on offense last season. He promises that will change in 2023. Only time will tell if experience proves to be more valuable than talent for Kansas State’s offense. For now, though, confidence is high. “We are going to get a lot of guys the ball and give them a lot of different touches this season,” Klieman said. “I think that will make us more difficult to defend.”