Kansas State Football: Realistic expectations for Chris Klieman in year one

Kansas State football will begin the Chris Klieman era in 2019 after having Bill Snyder at the helm for such a long time. What are realistic expectations for Klieman and the Cats in year one?

For the first time since the 2008 season, Bill Snyder won’t be patrolling the sidelines as the head coach of the Kansas State Wildcats. Snyder retired after the 2018 season concluded and then-North Dakota State head coach Chris Klieman was brought in to be the new man with a plan.

K-State football hasn’t been good without Snyder, so it’s understandable why some fans might be afraid of what will happen to the program now that he’s retired (again). Klieman won several titles during his time at North Dakota State, but the FCS isn’t quite up to par with the FBS. The adjustments could be tough for Klieman.

The hope is that he adjusts to a different level of college football and is the right man for the job in Manhattan. The Wildcats aren’t what they once were, but they’re also not completely irrelevant either. There’s talent on this team and only a few Big 12 teams actually have a legitimate shot at winning the conference.

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While winning is obviously great, fans shouldn’t expect Kansas State to be winning a ton of games right off the bat. It takes time to build something special and Klieman deserves a few years to build up the program.

Looking at Kansas State’s schedule in 2019, a realistic record would be somewhere right around .500 for the Cats, though if we’re being honest: Probably four or five wins is more likely.

They should win their first two games, which are non-conference match-ups against Nicholls and Bowling Green. Their final non-conference opponent, Mississippi State, whooped up on K-State IN Manhattan last year and the match-up is on the road this year, so that’s probably a loss for the purple team.

After that, it’s conference play for the duration of the season and a lot of those games really could go either way. The likeliest losses are against Oklahoma (even though it’s in Manhattan), at Oklahoma State, at Texas, and against West Virginia. Texas and West Virginia handled the Wildcats last year and are usually top 25 teams. OKST is simply a team that plays well on their home field.

As for the rest of the games, like I said above, it could go either way. K-State should be able to beat their in-state foe Kansas, but it was pretty close last year and the two teams both have a new head coach in 2019. That could be the first time KU wins the Sunflower Showdown in over a decade.

As I mentioned above, a .500 record for Chris Klieman in his first year would be welcomed by Kansas State football fans. This is a program that didn’t get to play in a bowl game last year, so getting to 6-6 and playing in a bowl game would be a wonderful first season for the new head coach of the Wildcats.

What do you think, K-State fans? What is a realistic expectation for Chris Klieman in 2019?