Kansas State Wildcats Lose to Auburn Tigers
By Eddie Grier
With the fifth largest crowd recorded at Bill Snyder Family Stadium, the 20th ranked Kansas State Wildcats were looking to make some big time noise in front of a national primetime audience. Unfortunately, the Wildcats made too many mistakes and missed too many opportunities, falling to Auburn 20-14 on Thursday night.
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Over the course of the game, K-State had every opportunity to cash in and they just could not deliver. K-State left points on the boards in what could have been a big time upset, which only made Thursday night even more disappointing.
Three turnovers along with three costly missed field goals by Jake Cantele (who was later replaced due to his mistakes) doomed the Wildcats’ chances. This was a game where both teams seemed like they could not make the big play.
Turns out Auburn made just enough plays on a K-State defense who played outstanding the entire night. Let’s take a look between the lines at the K-State loss.
K-State Game Leaders
Jake Waters 24 of 40 245 yards 2 INT’s
Charles Jones 11 carries 22 yards TD
Curry Sexton 11 catches 121 yards
Randall Evans 9 tackles
#5 Auburn 20, #20 K-State 14
K-State Offensive Recap
Fourteen points were scored against the Auburn defense, and there could have been more points honestly. The Wildcats probably left about 16-21 more points out there on the field.
The story of the game for the Wildcats was not putting points on the board. Similar to the Iowa State game where there could have been more points, the same thing transferred here against the Tigers.
A missed field goal by Cantele, followed later on by a touchdown pass that should have been caught by Tyler Lockett popped into the air for an interception. Fast forward further and two more missed field goals and a costly interception by Jake Waters doomed Kansas State.
One of the highlights for Kansas State was the play of wide receiver Curry Sexton who had 11 catches for 121 yards. This was definitely Sexton’s best game with KSU.
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K-State Defensive Recap
The highlight of the night for the Cats was this entire defense unit, which came to play. The defense held Auburn to no third down conversations through the first half of the game.
The KSU defense was winning the battle on first down all night. Unfortunately, the Cats started to wear down a little bit. K-State had opportunities to get turnovers in the fourth quarter, but could not hold on to the ball.
An impressive point for this K-State defense was that they held the Tigers to 128 total yards rushing. Auburn came in putting up 200 yards rushing per game.
Dakorey Johnson was all over field for K-State recording had 6 tackles while Randall Evans had 9. But a big pass conversion from Nick Marshall to Duke Williams was all she wrote.
Moving Forward
The Kansas State Wildcats have a week to recover from this loss before taking on UTEP on September 27th in Manhattan. Look for the Cats to win big, as this loss surely will be in the back of their minds. How can it not be? Kansas State has to play better in order to contend for the first ever college football playoffs.