Returning talent means more mouths to feed, more wrinkles to add for Kotelnicki

AUG 4, 2023
Andy Kotelnicki, the Kansas football team’s offensive coordinator, envisions the Kansas football team’s workload as a pie.
That pie, he said Thursday, comprises 803 cumulative snaps — the average of 73 offensive plays per team in a Big 12 Conference game, with 11 players — to be distributed among the different members of his unit.
Even within the tight end room, his primary responsibility as a position coach, Kotelnicki notes that Mason Fairchild’s size and strength justify putting him inside, Trevor Kardell’s length means he can get out on the perimeter and Jared Casey can line up in all sorts of places.
And that’s just one position group, not to mention his two top-level returning options at quarterback, four at running back and at least seven at wide receiver, before you even get into offensive line permutations.
“You could be out there with five receivers on the field and line up in a bunch of different formations, do a lot of things, and the next snap you go out there with four running backs, and do some of those things,” Kotelnicki said. “And so our players have really embraced that multiplicity piece.”
Add to that the fact that because so much of his personnel is consistent from 2022, what Kotelnicki calls KU’s “offensive volume” — its variety of plays and concepts — can expand even further, and his offense is likely to reach new levels of intricacy and eccentricity this season. (“In theory that’s what should happen,” he said, “but you still have to be careful because it has to be sustainable.”)
So where will the Jayhawks turn for inspiration, as they look to add more wrinkles to an already successful offense? Both externally and internally, apparently.
For one thing, he said, they love to steal from other teams.
“We are the greatest thieves in the country,” Kotelnicki said. “Seriously, we have people scouring film in all departments, looking.”
That could mean taking short-yardage plays from a top short-yardage squad in the college ranks, or third-down inspiration from one of the NFL’s best at converting. Kotelnicki said he particularly enjoys watching the Kansas City Chiefs — “They’re fun to watch for sure, they’re creative, they’re similar mindsets, I think.”
A lot of his additions to the scheme, he said, are just different ways of presenting things that the Jayhawks already do in some form.
There will still be a steady flow of new ideas, though, in part because Kotelnicki has entrusted his players with presenting their own play suggestions, which gives them “a little ownership in what we’re doing.”
“I said, ‘It’s got to be good, you can’t come up with some BS now and just think it’s going to happen,'” he said, “and to their credit, they critically think about it, they put it in our terminology.”
The tight ends have already taken turns presenting their own ideas. Kotelnicki said he’s selected two plays that he plans to use but has yet to install.