Kansas State Football: Three things that went wrong vs West Virginia

3. The offense relied on the defense too much.

This has been a season-long trend for the Kansas State Wildcats, as when the offense begins struggling they begin to rely on the defense too much to turn it around instead of trying better play calls. This has shown up in every game this year and this time it was the reason K-State lost.

A team cannot win if the offense relies too much on the defense or even special teams and continue to struggle, something has to change in the gameplan to get the offense going. Courtney Messingham has not been great at calling the offense so far this year.

Kansas State has relied on Deuce Vaughn and Briley Moore on offense too much this season, and West Virginia stopped both of them from being huge factors. For the offense to get on the right track again, Messingham needs to call plays to get the ball to other targets, like the receivers, and not fully rely on Vaughn.

4. The Wildcats were playing with heavy hearts today.

I know I said the three main things that went wrong, but I cannot ignore the emotional toll on the players’ day before the game. For those who do not know, Derick Newton died on Thursday and the Wildcats were distraught by the news, as teammates of Newton’s posted on Twitter their memories and emotions once the news came out.

With this game comes a lot of learning for the Kansas State Wildcats and hopefully they learn quickly and continue this good season.