Why Chris Klieman remains opposed to a Kansas State football spring game in any form
Most college football teams play a spring game in front of fans every April.
Some college football teams prefer to hold a more casual event with fans in attendance and call it a spring showcase.
Kansas State has capped off spring football practices with both types of those events in the past, but the Wildcats have taken an entirely different approach of late. For the second straight year, K-State will end its spring season without a public event that is open to fans.
Head football coach Chris Klieman thinks the Wildcats are better off spending all 15 of their spring practices in a controlled environment without anyone watching. And he has no plans to change that approach, even though some fans would prefer the return of a spring game.
“Here’s an easy answer,” Kleiman said on Friday. “It could be something as simple as, ‘Well, I just want to be there and watch the guys.’ I want everybody to see Deuce Vaughn in the fall. I understand everybody wants to see Deuce Vaughn in the spring, but for three years that kid didn’t get touched in the spring. And he was able to have pretty good falls.”
This has always been Klieman’s style. He didn’t hold a spring event at North Dakota State when he coached for the Bison.
Early on, he experimented with a spring showcase at K-State, but it wasn’t for him. He didn’t like the risk of injury, especially to a star running back like Vaughn.
“I understand it from fan’s perspective,” Klieman said. “They want to come and watch some of the young guys, but they also want to come and watch guys like Deuce Vaughn. Every time Deuce carries the football in March and April I’m holding on for dear life and hoping that somebody doesn’t fall on the kid and tear his knee. That is a little bit of why we don’t do it.”
Klieman also thinks a closed practice is more beneficial than an open scrimmage.
“We want work to be done in a controlled environment,” Klieman said. “We get a second-and third-down period, we get red zone, we get third-and-fourth-down period. We get all these situational things without just saying put the ball out there and play. It’s something that I have been doing for a long time and I firmly believe that that’s the best thing for us, unless something changes where get more people here and more bodies.”
It won’t come as a surprise, then, to learn that Klieman is also opposed to college football teams playing against each other in public scrimmages during the spring.
Some coaches have been pushing for that model. Not Klieman.
“That doesn’t make a lot of sense to me,” Klieman said. “These kids are young people and we have to give their bodies time to heal. All of us are also dealing with roster management. I don’t care what level you’re at, from Division III to Power Five to the blue-blood programs. Nobody wants to put their best players out there on April 18 in a big-time scrimmage.”
This story was originally published April 21, 2023 at 3:20 PM with the headline "Why Chris Klieman remains opposed to a Kansas State football spring game in any form."