Kansas football knows the road it faces in Lance Leipold’s fifth season as head coach. The 2025 season will offer new tests for the Jayhawks, as they will face five programs KU hasn’t played in over a decade. A rivalry will be renewed with Missouri and KU will travel to new places like Arizona and UCF over the 15 week season.
With the release of the Big 12 schedule last week, KU has its path set in 2025. Will the Jayhawks get back to bowl eligibility? Could KU push for a second nine win season under Leipold or even contend for a Big 12 title? There will be a few key games for KU to do any one of those three things. As we saw last season, an early non-conference road game at Illinois showed some of KU’s deficiencies that ended up defining the first half of the season. Through conference play there were plenty of close games and intriguing matchups.
Today, we’ll look at three of the most intriguing games on KU’s 2025 schedule…
Saturday, September 6 – At Missouri
The Border Showdown is back. The Jayhawks will get an early litmus test as they travel east to take on the Tigers. The two teams haven’t faced off since the 2011 season and KU will look to snap a three-game losing skid to Missouri in what will be one of the most hostile atmospheres KU will play in during the 2025 campaign.
The contest will serve as a massive test for a new-look KU team. Sure, Fresno State could pose a question or two in Week 0 but the Wagner game in Week 1 won’t be a huge test. The Week 2 contest in Columbia willbe our first real look at the Jayhawks and where their strengths and weakness lie on both sides of the ball.
Missouri will be breaking in a new quarterback in its second game of the season. The Tigers brought in Penn State transfer Beau Pribula who doesn’t have a ton of experience. Drew Pyne wasn’t convincing in relief of Brady Cook and Sam Horn is equally inexperienced to Pribula. The game will be new KU defensive coordinator D.K. McDonald’s first chance to really show what his defense will be about.
The KU offense — and particularly its offensive line — will face a stiff challenge in the Missouri front seven. KU’s front five has performed well over the last two years but the unit will be breaking in at least three new full time starters. KU will need consistent play from Jalon Daniels too and the game will be Daniels’ first real test with his new skill position targets.
KU will get an extra day of prep due to the scheduling of the Week 1 games (KU plays at home on Friday night while Missouri plays at home on Saturday). The Jayhawks will also have two games under their belt compared to Missouri’s one game.
The rivalry game will show us a lot about where KU is at heading into conference play.
Saturday, October 11 – At Texas Tech
Texas Tech is going to be one of the most intriguing teams in college football in 2025. Outside of North Carolina, I’m not sure if there is a more interesting non-powerhouse program than the Red Raiders.
If you missed it, Texas Tech spent an exorbitant on its transfer portal class. Some reports indicate Joey McGuire’s program spent more than $10 million on its transfer class alone and that’s before you factor in money that will go towards players currently on the Texas Tech roster. The Red Raiders pulled off some major recruiting wins en route to the No. 3 transfer class in the 247Sports rankings. Just how good is it? Texas Tech landed 11 four-star transfers and 10 of the top 150 players in the portal.
In recent years, KU and Texas Tech have played in some competitive games. This year’s contest should be no different. Texas Tech expects to be in the conference title race and KU will have the chance to make a big statement on the road against what will be one of the more talented teams in the conference on paper.
As we’ve seen over the last season or two, on paper talent doesn’t always equal on field results.
From a KU perspective, the road trip to Lubbock looks to be KU’s toughest conference road trip on paper. The game will mark the end of a stretch in which the Jayhawks play four-straight games, which is actually the longest stretch of games KU plays without a bye week all season. KU enters the game off the back of a road game at UCF, which will certainly test the Jayhawks and their resolve prior to their second of three bye weeks.
Friday, November 28 OR Saturday, November 29 – Vs. Utah
I find this game particularly intriguing for a few reasons.
First off, the game has been selected as a flex opportunity for TV networks. Arizona vs. Arizona State is the other Big 12 option that could get flexed to Black Friday. If KU or Utah is in the thick of the conference title race, then I’d expect the game to get flexed to Friday and the same would be said for the Duel in the Desert.
Second, KU and Utah have not faced off on the gridiron since the turn of the century. The two teams last played in the 1990s and have only played four times in history.
Traditionally, Kyle Whittingham’s teams have been incredibly physical. We’ve seen KU as a program become a much more physical team under Lance Leipold and the contest — although at the end of the season — will serve as another benchmark for KU in its progression.
If you want to go with the most positive outcome for both programs over the first 11 games of the season, there is a world in which either one (or maybe) are potentially competing for a spot in the Big 12 title game heading into the final week. Now, Utah has — what looks to be on paper — a tough conference state. But the Big 12 is going to be super competitive once again and there’s no telling how it could play out. I think it makes this a particularly intriguing game.
This content is reposted from the source: https://247sports.com/college/kansas/article/kansas-football-2025-schedule-analysis-245623411/
