LAWRENCE — Kansas coach Lance Leipold’s Jayhawks seem to find another gear when coming off a bye week.
KU has won its last three games when coming off a bye, most recently defeating Houston 42-14 two weeks ago at Arrowhead Stadium. But this season is a little different as the Jayhawks got two bye weeks. The latest giving them extra time to prepare for Saturday’s game against No. 17 Iowa State.
Leipold said sticking largely to past schedules during the bye week has proven beneficial for his team.
“Hopefully the routine and the focus and resetting ourselves at a point to go out and play well and hopefully be a little fresher than at other times,” Leipold said Monday at his weekly press conference. “And again, we’ve got a huge challenge with a ranked football team coming in here. And this will be another test of that coming off a bye week.
“I don’t know if we’ve had two open weeks like this in a season before — I don’t remember it that way. But we’ll see where we’re at. Obviously, we’ve had decent success off of it, and hopefully it can repeat itself.”
The Jayhawks (2-6) have had two weeks to stew on their 29-27 loss to rival Kansas State, while the Cyclones (7-1) lost 23-22 to Texas Tech a week ago.
“It’s going to be a team that’s going to come in here and want to put themselves back on track,” Leipold said of the Cyclones. “They have a chance yet to compete for the conference championship, and they’re still in the playoff conversation. And it’ll be a huge test for us.”
Unlike the Cyclones, the Jayhawks are clinging to their postseason hopes. KU will have to win its last four games to qualify for a bowl game. While Leipold said he has discussed the math with his team, it’s not something he focuses on.
“Our guys know,” Leipold said. “They know how many you need to win and where it’s at. And we have guys that are focused on doing everything we can to win out and give us opportunities to play more football.
“I don’t want to put us in a pressing situation either. It’s a balance for me and how we approach that. We don’t like talking about a lot of things that aren’t there, but they know. There’s a lot of things that guys can talk about what they want to do and what their goals can be, and we know what this game means.”
