What’s the ceiling for Lance Leipold, Kansas football in 2024?

Kansas has about as trivial of a start as a hopeful team could ask for

The act of analyzing Kansas’s non-conference bunch is rather straightforward, as the Jayhawks get all three opponents out of the way in the first three weeks of the season. Not only that, but it’s weak by just about any above-average Power Four team’s standards.

It goes as follows: Lindenwood, at Illinois, UNLV. In other words: A name that’s still quite new to the FCS, a 5-7 squad that lost to KU by double-digits last year, and a decent Group of Five one that suffered the same fate in the postseason. A third way of putting it would be a 3-0 start for Kansas.

From there we get into league play, and I’ll be honest, it’s not an easy start, as the Jayhawks head into Morgantown to face West Virginia. Finishing 2023 with a record of 9-4, the Mountaineers were no worse than Kansas after a steep turnaround of their own.

They also didn’t face Kansas last year, yet if they had, it could have very well gone their way, as head coaches Leipold and Neal Brown are yet to have a one-sided encounter. Therefore, this game is one of just a couple of tripwires I mentioned Kansas having on its schedule in my previous piece.

It’s not all bad though, as the key word there was “couple;” it doesn’t appear the Jayhawks should have anyone giving them nearly as tough of a run for their money as WVU for weeks after their battle.

For the sake of putting things into perspective, they face the Mountaineers on Sept. 21, and don’t face another team coming off a winning season until Oct. 26. The schmucks that file in between those dates are TCU (5-7), Arizona State (3-9), and Houston (4-8), with the Horned Frogs and Cougars going on the road. I hopefully shouldn’t have to write a thesis for you on why Kansas has them covered.