MORGANTOWN, W.Va. – Year No. 43 at Milan Puskar Stadium kicks off this Saturday evening when West Virginia takes on Kansas in a rare early-September Big 12 matchup in Morgantown.
 
The Jayhawks (1-0) are coming off 56-10 victory over Tennessee Tech last Friday night in Lawrence. Kansas jumped out to an early 21-0 lead and had little trouble disposing of the Golden Eagles, from the Ohio Valley Conference.
 
Devin Neal (5-foot-11, 210 pounds) rushed for 108 yards on only four carries, Nebraska transfer Sevion Morrison (6-foot, 212 pounds) contributed 70 yards on eight totes and sophomore Daniel Hishaw Jr. (5-foot-10, 215 pounds) added 56 yards on five attempts as Kansas generated 297 yards and six touchdowns on the ground.
 
Quarterback Jalon Daniels (6-foot, 215 pounds) was an efficient 15-of-18 passing for 189 yards and a touchdown, while the KU defense limited Tennessee Tech to only 190 yards of total offense, the fewest yards it has surrendered in 12 years.
 
In its 49 plays from scrimmage, Kansas' offense averaged 10.2 yards per play, one of only two teams in the country to do that last week. Air Force was the other.
 
Second-year coach Lance Leipold has blended 27 four-year transfers with a youthful roster that played well down the stretch last season, the Jayhawks upsetting Texas in Austin and dropping one-possession decisions at TCU and to West Virginia to conclude the 2021 campaign.
 
"I have a lot of respect for Lance and his staff," West Virginia coach Neal Brown said. "We played them in a bowl game when he was at Buffalo and we were at Troy. They're disciplined, and they don't beat themselves. They have a low number of turnovers. They don't have penalties, and they're playing with a lot of confidence right now.
 
"You think about their last four games. They go on the road and win at Texas and lose on the last possession on the road at TCU. Our '21 team, it's a one-possession game, and they lost at home with both sides having a bunch of injuries, and then they win big."
 
Twenty-three KU players on last year's two-deep for the WVU game return in 2022, including the dual-threat Daniels, who will be making just his 11^th career start this Saturday.
 
The Lawndale, California, resident has completed 60% of his 287 career pass attempts for 1,767 yards and nine touchdowns. He's scored seven times on the ground as well.
 

"They are just a different team with Jalon Daniels playing quarterback," Brown pointed out. "He's got confidence, and he's a dual-threat guy, but he's a passer first. He's accurate, and he throws the deep ball well. They hit some explosive plays (against Tennessee Tech), and you saw it last year against Texas."
 
The real strength of Kansas' offense, however, is a group of running backs that Brown labels among the strongest in the Big 12. Neal is approaching 1,000 yards for his career after generating 707 yards last year as a freshman. He is averaging an impressive 5.0 yards per carry.
 
Hishaw sat out last year after gaining 229 yards as a true freshman in 2020, while Morrison and Minnesota transfer Ky Thomas (5-foot-11, 200 pounds) give the Jayhawks impressive depth. WVU fans are all too familiar with Thomas, who earned Guaranteed Rate Bowl Offensive MVP honors last December after rushing for 144 yards and a touchdown in the Golden Gophers' 18-6 victory.
 
"The Neal kid is really good; then they got the Thomas guy who was at Minnesota last year who ran for a bunch of yards against us," Brown noted. "They've got a Nebraska transfer, and they've got another kid (Daniel Hishaw) who is a big, physical runner who sat out last year. They're four deep with legitimate, upper-end Big 12 running backs."
 
Up front, Kansas returns four of five starters including left tackle Earl Bostick Jr. (6-foot-6, 310 pounds), whom Brown labels "an upper-tier" Big 12 offensive lineman. Center Mike Novitsky (6-foot-5, 296 pounds) is another good one and is one of four former Leipold offensive linemen who transferred from Buffalo.
 
The only new starter up front is Central Missouri transfer Dominick Puni (6-foot-5, 315 pounds) at left guard.
 
Lawrence Arnold (6-foot-3, 200 pounds) and Luke Grimm (6-foot, 190 pounds) return at wide receiver and will team with sophomore Quinton Skinner (6-foot-5, 190 pounds), Minnesota transfer Douglas Emilien (6-foot-1, 190 pounds) and Texas Tech transfer Kevin Terry (6-foot-1, 195 pounds). Brown indicated the Jayhawks will also use as many as three different tight ends with senior Mason Fairchild (6-foot-5, 261 pounds) listed as their starter.
 
Kansas' four-down defense is led by senior safety Kenny Logan (6-foot, 210 pounds), an All-Big 12 First Team choice in 2021. He was the only player in the country last year to record at least 113 tackles, six pass breakups and force multiple fumbles.
 
"He's a really good tackler, and he's the guy who gets them lined up in the back end," Brown said. "He's really sharp, and you can tell he's an intelligent football player."
 
Miami, Ohio transfer Lonnie Phelps (6-foot-3, 245 pounds) was responsible for a team-best seven tackles and three sacks last Friday from his defensive end spot, while seven other players contributed to Kansas' 12 tackles for losses.
 
Eleven different four-year transfers are listed on the KU two-deep, one of whom is former Ohio State linebacker Craig Young (6-foot-3, 225 pounds). 
 
Brown says the Kansas secondary is long and athletic.
 
"They played some young guys there last year, and I think it's paying off for them. They've got some depth there," he said.
 
Special teams-wise, Logan is a dangerous kickoff returner who returned two for 82 yards in last year's game against West Virginia in Lawrence. He returned two kicks for touchdowns against South Dakota and also brought one back against Texas Tech.
 
Punting is still somewhat of a mystery because Kansas didn't have to punt in last week's win.
 
Kansas is still hunting for its first-ever victory in Morgantown in an 11-game series that favors West Virginia 10-1. KU's only triumph came in Lawrence in 2013.
 
"At the end of the year, you are going to look back and say, 'Hey, this is one of the most improved teams in the entire country,'" Brown predicted.
 
West Virginia (0-1) is coming off a disappointing 38-31 loss at 17^th-ranked Pitt last Thursday night. The Mountaineers were leading 31-24 with less than six minutes to play before Pitt erupted for 14 unanswered points, the big play being M.J. Devonshire's 56-yard interception return for a touchdown.
 
West Virginia drove to the Pitt 23 before facing a 4^th-and-17 play at the Panther 28 with less than a minute to play. Quarterback JT Daniels' first-down-gaining pass to Reese Smith was ruled a catch on the field but was overturned by the replay official. 
 
Pitt took a knee twice to end the game.
 
"Going in, I thought we had a chance to be a good football team and coming out of that game, after watching it, I know we do," Brown said. "We're much improved. We look like a totally different team than how we finished in the bowl game, which was the expectation, and that's definitely what we saw on film.
 
Saturday's contest will kick off at 6 p.m. and will be televised on Big 12 Now on ESPN+ (Courtney Lyle, Forrest Conoly and Tori Petry). Mountaineer Sports Network from Learfield radio coverage begins at 3 p.m. on stations throughout West Virginia and online via WVUsports.com and the popular mobile app WVU Gameday.
 
Saturday's game has been labeled a Gold Rush with all fans attending encouraged to wear gold. Tickets are still available and can be purchased by logging on to WVUGAME.com.