Kansas swept BYU from undefeated ranks on Saturday, defeating the Cougars 17-13 in Provo. Lance Leipold spoke to the media after the game about the pooch punt that helped the Jayhawks take the lead, his team’s defensive performance and his team’s emotions after the win.
Practice makes perfect with Pooch Punt
Early in the fourth quarter, Kansas opted to have Jalon Daniels kick a snap kick after the Jayhawks were in no man’s land on fourth-and-long. The punt hit a BYU player’s helmet and Quentin Skinner was able to fall on it.
After the lucky break, the Jayhawks scored the game-winning touchdown. Leipold said they have always put this into practice, and it has worked out to their advantage.
“We’ve done it every Thursday since I’ve been head coach, and I think we’ve done it three times, and two of them have worked really well, and this was one of them,” Leipold said. “So it’s something we’ve been working on. It’s something to have just in case. Obviously it wasn’t supposed to work the way it played there, but it was huge. And again, Quentin Skinner, who’s on the punt team to begin with, does a great job of talking things through, was really aware of the situation and landed on the ball.
It was the second time this season that Kansas had a chance to recover a muffed punt. It was called back against Illinois, but the same refereeing team allowed the call to stand.
“I said something to the crew on duty,” Leipold said. “It’s the same team we had in Illinois when we had a chance to bounce back. That was a whack and they got the ball back. It ended up being a big play. This one went our way.”
The defense comes forward and seizes the route
Kansas allowed just 13 points on Saturday, the fewest BYU has scored in a game this season. The defense was strong for much of the game and made big plays when it mattered.
As halftime approached it looked like BYU would take the lead and head the ball out of the break. Mello Dotson picked off Jake Retzlaff in the end zone as the Cougars were driving to keep the game tied at 10-10 at halftime.
“Well, as you can see, that was a huge piece,” Leipold said. “It was great that Mello made such a great piece again. They chose to go the fade route, and he made a turnover attempt, especially with the, I’m sure they were aggressive in nature knowing they had the ball coming out of the second half .
BYU scored on a marathon 17-play, 10:26 drive to open the second half. However, the Jayhawks limited the Cougars to three instead of seven. Leipold said it was one of the longest drives he has seen in his career, and that holding BYU to a field goal was “huge.”
It also looked like BYU would take a late lead and sneak out with a win, with the ball inside the red zone with less than two minutes to play. However, a false start forced a fourth-and-long, and the Jayhawks came up with the stop and the win.
“We had a plan, they could try to run it twice and then the penalty gave us some space to work with and we were able to make the play and come up with some good solid tackles,” Leipold said. “Probably some of our better tackling was in that later part of those drives. So it was huge to see.”
Excited, proud of his team
This season hasn’t been the easiest for the Jayhawks. They got off to a rough start, but never gave up and put themselves on a trajectory to finish the season strong. Leipold continues to emphasize how proud he is of his team’s ability to stick together.
“What you’ve heard me say for weeks in a row is that this group has stayed together and kept working. And that is really true. I’m very proud of the way they did it,” Leipold said. “The way our leadership has really led this team, our coaching staff and the work they’ve done. And the fact that we’re getting back-to-back wins over ranked teams says a lot about that and what it’s all about.
