Manhattan, KS– The 2012 K-State football season brought a heisman trophy finalist, and a second Big 12 conference title. With many starters are role players now graduated, Head Coach Bill Snyder will have one of his bigger rebuilding jobs. Saturday provided K-State fans first glimpse at the 2013 football team.

1.) Sams or Waters? The main question going into the spring game was who will be K-States new starting quarterback? That question remains unanswered, as expected. So. Daniel Sams showed his wheels, in addition to showing his improved passing ability. While JUCO transfer, Jake Waters displayed his hyped up passing ability, and showed speed on the ground. Both quarterbacks combined to complete 32 of 46 passes, throwing for 640 yards and seven touchdowns. Neither quarterback did much to separate himself from the other. But both made a strong case to be Collin Klein’s successor.

2.) Miller Making Strides- The same day Chris Harper was drafted by the Seattle Seahawks in the fourth round of the NFL draft, Senior Torell Miller put on a dazzling performance in the K-State spring game. Bill Snyders Cats return two of their top three players from a year ago, but neither Tramaine Thompson or Tyler Lockett can provide a true physical presence down the field. 6-2, 216 pound Miller can provide the physical downfield presence that Harper has provided for the past two years. Miller caught five passes for 108 yards and two touchdowns.

3.) Gronk Nation- Glenn Gronkowski also made an appearance. Replacing sixth round draft pick Braden Wilson as the starting fullback, the 6-3 Gronk looked like a very valid replacement to the four year starter Wilson. In addition to showcasing his blocking ability, Gronk caught a TD pass and converted a two point conversion.

4.) Andre McDonald Sighting- After a breakout sophomore season in the 2011 Cotton Bowl season, disciplinary reasons caused McDonalds playing time to decrease a year ago. Some had questioned whether or not he was still on the team. McDonald displayed the physicality that made him known among K-State faithful in the 2011 season. McDonald had an efficient eight catches for 80 yards, in addition to barreling over a handful of white team defenders.

5.) Defense Beginning to Take Form- K-State graduates nine of their eleven defensive started from the 2012 Big 12 Champion team. Tre Walker Ty Zimmerman are the only returning starters. Although not much can be taken away from the spring as far as defense is concerned, K-State fans did get to see a glimpse of what the 2013 defense will look like. The defense looked fairly strong against the run, but struggled at defending the pass, Snyder mentioned in the post game press conference.

In the end, it was a normal K-State spring game. The offense dazzled, the defense dominated, and many questions remain unanswered. There is still a long way to go, and more players to see before the 2013 football season gets underway. Only a certain amount can be learned from the intrasquad scrimmage. One this is for certain, the race to be K-States next quarterback is anything but decided.

• Waters starts with Purple squad, Sams with the 2nd string White squad
• Dante Barnett, Ty Zimmerman, Dorian Roberts, and Randall Evans start in the secondary
• Evans moves to nickel corner in nickel package, Kip Daily comes into Corner
• Jonathan Truman and Blake Slaughter start at Linebacker
• Waters looks strong in 1st quarter with the Purples, 7-9 for 104 yards and a TD
• Waters 4 carries for 28 yards and read option TD
• Sams extremely hindered by green jersey
• Joins purple team in the 2nd quarter and looks strong
• 10-15 for 222 yards and 2 TDS
• 2 Carries 19 yards and a TD
• QB Race still up in the air

Stillwater, OK– K-States hopes of a conference championship now lie in the hands of the Baylor Bears. Oklahoma State ended the Cats hopes at an outright share of the Big 12 title with a 76-70 victory in Stillwater.

K-State trailed the Pokes 36-30  at halftime, and used a 20-5 run to take a 9 point lead midway through the second half. But through the efforts of Le’Bryan Nash and Marcus Smart, the Cowboys answered with a 12-2 run of their own to regain the lead over K-State.

Nash was solid all night scoring 24 points, and dominated down low for the majority of the game. K-State consistently gave up easy baskets to the Pokes, including Nash who was able to get a handful of easy dunks in the paint. Oklahoma State outscored K-State 36-24 in the paint.

K-State looked to be in control and on pace to their 1st Big 12 title, when McGruder buried a 3 in response to Marcus Smart alley oop which had cut the K-State lead to 5.

Nino williams, who scored 17 in the first meeting with the Cowboys, only managed 2 points in fifteen minutes on 1-4 shooting.

McGruder completed an old fashioned 3 point play with 4:45 to go, but K-State would not score from the field again until Spradling hit a three at the 20 second mark when the game was already out of reach.

MANHATTAN, Kan. (AP) – Angel Rodriguez had 21 points and 10 assists and Shane Southwell and Martavious Irving both added 15 points as No. 9 Kansas State beat TCU 79-68 on Tuesday night.

With the Senior Night victory, the Wildcats (25-5, 14-3 Big East) stayed tied with No. 4 Kansas for first place in the Big 12 with one regular season game to play.

Kansas State seniors Jordan Henriquez, Irving and Rodney McGruder extended their career win total to 99, more than any class in school history.

Kyan Anderson had 29 points for the Horned Frogs (10-20, 1-16), while Devonta Abron added 10.

The Wildcats kept their distance for most of the game, but the Horned Frogs made it interesting early in the second half by slashing into a 42-27 halftime deficit with a 12-2 run.

Manhattan, KS– Following Saturday’s buzzer beating victory over Baylor, the Kansas State Wildcats have moved up 4 spots to No. 9 in the AP poll.

With just one week remaining in the regular season, K-State is in a great position looking ahead to the NCAA tourney. Currently projected as high as a 2 seed and as low as a 4 seed, K-state is also looking ahead to the possibility of winning their first conference championship since 1977.

With two games to play, Senior night against TCU and a road trip to No. 13 Oklahoma St., its looking to be a very big week for Kansas State basketball.

A win over both TCU and Oklahoma St., would earn K-State at least a share with the conference leading Kansas Jayhawks. But if Kansas loses at least 1 of its 2 remaining games, home against Texas Tech tonight, and a road trip to Baylor to end the season on Saturday, K-State will have a chance to win the conference outright.

If K-State manages to claim a share of the title, they will be the first team in the conferences history to claim shares of the Big 12 title in both football, and men’s basketball. A feat that will be remembered for a long time to come.

Lawrence, KS– Same song different verse. In a game where K-State was looking to deliver a knockout punch to KU’s conference title hopes, they received a knock out punch themselves, over and over and over again.

KU came into Sunflower Showdown following a 3 game losing skid to OSU, TCU, and OU. They did all they did to prove why they were ranked No. 2 in the nation just a few short weeks ago, finishing off K-State 83-62 in front of a sold out Allen Field House.

The Cats got off to a decent start, only trailing KU by 3 points at the first media TO. But following foul trouble for both Henriquez and Gipson, KU went on a 21-6 run to blow the game wide open in the first half.

Kevin Young added the exclamation point with an easy dunk to end the half and send K-State into the half down big, 47-29.

Maybe it was the losing skid, maybe it was returning home, or maybe it was just because it was his birthday. Whatever the reason, KU star Fr. Ben Mclemore went off, finishing with 17 in the first half alone, and 30 overall.

“It happens, we’re still in first place, and if we win the rest of our games we win the league, we cant let one loss become two losses” Weber said after the game.

K-State tried to make a push in the second half, cutting the lead down to 15, but KU quickly responded with a run of their own to quickly finish off the Cats small hope at a comeback.

Three Wildcats finished in double figures including, McGruder with 20, Rodriguez with 17, and Spradling with 10.

But no one played great for K-State. K-State was outrebounded by KU 41-23. Coupled with 14 turnovers, K-State lacked the spirit and fight that made them so deadly in their past 4 victories.

In the end, its not the end of the world for K-State. KU arguably played their best game of the season, while K-State played its worse. K-State is still level on games with the Jayhawks and a share of the conference title is still within reach.

Maybe its the weather, or just bad luck but K-State does not play good in Allen Fieldhouse. Last season the Cats bounced back from a blowout in Lawrence, with a dominating victory over No. 6 Missouri. A bounce back victory over Baylor on Saturday and K-State can easily get back on track. Let this loss blossom into two and K-State can kiss their conference title hopes goodbye.

“I know my teammates were going to come in on Wednesday ready to fight and get ready  for Baylor on Saturday”, McGruder said in the post game, for K-States sake, he better be right.  

Manhattan, KS– “Why settle for second when first is available” former K-State Head Coach Bob Huggins said during his introductory press conference. Huggins is long gone, and so is his successor, Frank Martin. Yet here the Cats sit as the lone team atop the conference, 7-2 and one game ahead of Oklahoma State and arch rival Kansas. Tonight the Cats will look to stay atop the conference, standing in their way their toughest game of the season. Big Monday in Allen Fieldhouse.

Kansas State vs. Kansas is just another game. A win over the Jayhawks is just another W in the win column, at least thats what the players said after beating Iowa State. But, to the Wildcat fan base, a win tonight against a reeling Jayhawk team will be a victory that will be remembered for a long time to come in Manhattan, KS.

In K-State 59-55 loss to Kansas earlier in the season, K-State was two missed threes away from a victory.

The Jayhawk defense left K-States shooters open on the perimeter on multiple occasions. The Cats were a mere 9-30 from beyond the arc. The majority of the misses were good open shots. Shots the Cats have been knocking down in recent games.

For K-State, the game will come down to three things, Rodney McGruder, continued lockdown defense, and the first 5 minutes.

Since K-State beat KU 59-55 in the 05/06 season, K-State has never been closer than 10 points at the 10 minute mark of the first half. Slow starts have done more than doom their chances in Lawrence. If K-State does not get off to a fast start, then we may very well see a repeat of K-States past blowouts.

No one seems more irritated about the KU game than Sr. Rodney McGruder. When asked about the KU game in Saturday’s post game press conference, McGruder responded and talked about how tired he was that the media was treating KU like it was a bigger game than all the others.

To McGruder it is just another game. But McGruder will have to put in a performance worthy of a star to bring a W. McGruder can not afford to get in early foul trouble like he has in games against Texas and OU.

If K-State wants to walk out of Lawrence victorious, McGruder will have to play more than 33 minutes and pour in a performance like he did Saturday against the Clones when the Sr. scored 22 points while adding 3 rebounds, 5 assists and 4 steals.

If there’s one thing K-State and Bruce Weber have held over from Frank Martin’s tenure, its solid defense. K-State has evolved into arguably the best defense in the country. K-State held Kansas to its lowest scoring output of the season when the two teams last met in January. Another great defensive performance tonight and K-State has a very good shot of walking away with a win.

For as big of a win as this could be for K-State, a loss will be equally as devastating for Kansas. The Jayhawks are currently in the middle of a 3 game losing streak, and one could argue in a tailspin. All three losses were upsets at the hands of unranked teams, Oklahoma St, TCU, and Oklahoma.

If the loss to Oklahoma St. was a shock, the following loss to last placed TCU was a lightning bolt. TCU was winless in the big 12 at the time of the victory, and had not won a game since Dec. Ku followed up that embarrassing loss by putting in a better performance against OU in a game that still ended up as a 72-66 loss in Norman.

KU has not lost 4 in a row since 1988. The last time they lost back to back home games, also 1988, Kansas State 71-62 and Oklahoma 75-63.

The Jayhawks are aware of the pressure on them to win the game, and will likely come in firing on all cylinders.

For K-State it may simply be a matter of weathering the storm. No team in the Big 12 is playing better basketball than Kansas State. K-State has not had a game of this magnitude in a very long time. A win for the Cats would solidify their Big 12 title hopes and send the already exciting Cat fanbase into a frenzy, while a loss simply means game on in the title race.

A victory for KU and its back to business as usual, while a loss will be the death blow to an already wounded team.

Manhattan, KS– Paced by 22 points from Rodney McGruder and a season-high 20 points from Angel Rodriguez, No. 13 K-State (19-4, 8-2 Big 12) took care of business with a 79-70 win over the Iowa State Cyclones (16-7, 6-4 Big 12) in front of a sell-out crowd at Bramlage Coliseum.

A three pointer from McGruder at the top of the key capped an 11-2 K-State run during which the Wildcats turned a 50-50 ballgame with 11:57 remaining into a 61-52 Wildcat lead just three minutes later.

The win, coupled with Oklahoma’s 72-66 win over Kansas, left the Wildcats all alone in first place in the Big 12 standings.

After jumping out to an early lead the Wildcats had to battle back to gain a 33-32 halftime advantage. Iowa State went on 26 to 11 run, that covered over nine minutes of the first half, and saw the Cyclones build a 22-28 lead with 5:28 until halftime.

K-State used 17 second-chance points in the second half to pull away for the victory.  Thomas Gipson was key, scoring 11 of his 16 points during the second half and adding a team-high 7 rebounds.

K-State held Iowa State leading scorer Will Clyburn, who had 24 points and 10 rebounds in Iowa State’s 73-67 win over K-State in Ames, Iowa, to just 6 points and 2 boards in today’s contest.

K-State heads next about 90 miles east down I-70 to face the reeling Kansas Jayhawks on Monday night.  It will likely be the first time that the Wildcats be the higher-ranked team going into a Sunflower Showdown in Lawrence since 1982.