Kansas football’s defense is focused on one area vs. Illinois. It hurt them last year
Illinois quarterback Luke Altmyer had a pedestrian passing game against the Kansas Jayhawks last season, a game the Illini lost 34-23.
He threw for 202 yards, one touchdown and two interceptions, yet he punished the Jayhawks ... on the ground.
Altmyer had a 72-yard touchdown run and finished with two rushing scores. That represented a theme of sorts for Kansas last season: struggles containing a quarterback who could scramble.
As KU heads to Champaign, Illinois, to finish the home-and-home series against Illinois on Saturday, defensive tackle D.J. Withers emphasized that limiting Altmyer’s scrambling ability is a key to victory.
“We’ve been working on that — keeping our pass rush lanes,” Withers said. “There was a few times last year where we got out of our lanes. So I believe if we can just stay in our lanes, we can shut down all that scrambling because that’s the big thing we can’t have this year.”
Withers also pointed out that this Illinois team looks even better than last season’s. The Illini, who defeated Eastern Illinois 45-0 last week, went 5-7 in 2023.
“They’re real physical,” Withers said. “They got some new offensive lineman — they look good. So we’ve just got to come off the ball and stop the run game — I believe we can win this game.”
KU looks to build on its stellar defensive performance from last Thursday against FCS opponent Lindenwood. The Jayhawks’ defense limited the Lions to three points and allowed only 202 total yards.
Kansas defensive coordinator Brian Borland discussed three weak points KU’s defense hoped to focus on during fall camp: limiting third-down conversions and improving the run defense and red zone defense.
Borland assessed his unit’s performance in those areas on Tuesday.
“They were in the red zone once and kicked a field goal ... at the end of the game vs. some of our younger guys,” Borland said. “I don’t like the fact they drove downfield, but I liked the fact they ended up kicking a field goal.”
Borland did note the Jayhawks allowed “a couple of third-and-longs,” which came on similar play concepts.
“We had different coverages up — something we should be able to cover easily. And some reason, we didn’t,” Borland said. “Those are things you can always point to that we can keep getting better. … I thought our rush defense was pretty solid.”
As for his overall assessment of things entering Week 2?
“There’s always things we’ve got to clean up,” Borland said. “But all in all, I think we took some good steps in areas that we need to improve.”
