The Kansas Jayhawks football program is the intercollegiate football program of the University of Kansas. The program is classified in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Bowl Subdivision (FBS), and the team competes in the Big 12 Conference. The Jayhawks are led by head coach Lance Leipold.
The program's first season was 1890, making it one of the oldest college football programs. The team's home field is David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium, which opened in 1921 and is one of the oldest college football stadiums in the nation. Until 2014, Memorial Stadium was one of the few football stadiums in Division I that had a track encircling the field. The track was removed in 2014, as the university's newly built Rock Chalk Park sports complex opened for use by the school's outdoor track and field team. In 2019, immediately adjacent to the west of the stadium, the University of Kansas Football Indoor Practice Facility was completed. The facility was built using only private donations from University of Kansas alumni, most notably David Booth.
KU's all-time record is 610–686–58 as of the conclusion of the 2024 season."NCAA Statistics", stats.ncaa.org. Retrieved January 24, 2024. The program saw a re-emergence under head coach Mark Mangino who won 50 games in eight seasons. From the departure of Mangino to 2021, the Jayhawks struggled to meet the same success as under Mangino. The program's overall record in that time frame was 22–111 (.165 win percentage). They also never won more than three games and never more than a single conference win during that time frame. They also had two winless seasons and five losing streaks of 10 or more games. The Jayhawks also lost 46 straight road games from the final year under Mangino to 2018 and 56 straight road conference games which spanned from 2009 to 2021. The Jayhawks had a streak of 44 consecutive losses to teams ranked in the AP poll that stood from a loss to 24th ranked Oklahoma in 2009 until the 2022 Season when they beat 18th Oklahoma State 37–16. Kansas has made two bowl games in four years with Lance Leipold in charge of the Jayhawks.
While Kansas has yet to have a Heisman Trophy winner, they have had one Heisman finalist and 2 other players receive votes. John Hadl, Bobby Douglass, and David Jaynes all received votes, Jaynes being the only finalist. Other notable former Kansas players include Pro Football Hall of Famers Gale Sayers, John Riggins, and Mike McCormack, as well as All-Americans Nolan Cromwell, Dana Stubblefield, Aqib Talib, and Anthony Collins. Former line coach Mike Getto is the only coach to have gone on to become a head coach in the NFL. Additionally, two members of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame have been associated with Kansas Football: Phog Allen, who coached football at Kansas for a season in 1920, and Ralph Miller, who was a quarterback on the team from 1937 to 1940. Jim Bausch, who won gold in the decathlon at the 1932 Summer Olympics, was a running back at Kansas and was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame.
Kansas has appeared in fourteen bowl games, including three trips to the Orange Bowl (1948, 1969, and 2008). Kansas has also won six conference championships, most recently winning one in 1968. Kansas played in the first NCAA-contracted nationally televised regular season college football game on September 20, 1952, against TCU.
Along with Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, and Washington University in St. Louis, Kansas was a charter member of the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association in 1907, which evolved into the Big Eight Conference. The Big Eight was folded into the Big 12 in 1996, and Kansas is the only original member of the MVIAA that is still part of the Big 12.
History
The Jayhawks are one of the oldest football programs in the country, being founded in 1890. The most successful era for Kansas football was 1890 to 1952, when the program recorded four undefeated seasons and posted an overall winning percentage, over 300 wins, several conference championships, and made major bowl appearances. From 1953 to 1968, the Jayhawks continued to find success on the football field, sharing three conference titles and attending more bowl games, but the team's overall winning percentage during that era slipped. From 1969 through the 2009 season KU's winning percentage dipped to (195–263–9), but the team continued to find some success during this era, twice finishing in the top 10 of the AP Poll, including a 12–1 season in 2007 that ended with an Orange Bowl victory.
The losing accelerated during the years 2010 to 2021, during which the team posted a 23–118 record ( winning percentage), including two of the three winless seasons in the program's history. During the 2012 season, the program's all-time winning percentage fell below .500 for the first time since KU finished 1–2 in 1890. But 2021 also saw the hiring of current coach Lance Leipold, who has dramatically improved the team's records in his three seasons.
Early history (1890–1947)
The University of Kansas fielded its first football team in 1890, led by player-coach Will Coleman. Kansas traveled to nearby Baker University to play the first college football game in Kansas to start that season. After playing an abbreviated three-game season in 1890, KU played its first full schedule in 1891 and immediately found success, posting a 7–0–1 record under head coach E. M. Hopkins. The 1891 season also featured the school's first football game against the University of Missouri, the first game in what would become the long-running Border War rivalry, a 22–8 KU victory in Kansas City.
In 1899, Hall-of-Famer Fielding H. Yost served one season as KU's football coach, posting the first perfect season in school history (10–0). After the turn of the century, Hall-of-Famer John Outland, who played at KU in 1895–1896, returned to Kansas to serve as head coach, but struggled to a 3–5–2 record in his only season in 1901. The 1902 season featured the program's first game of its rivalry against Kansas State, a 16–0 Jayhawk win.
The program had ten head coaches in its first 14 seasons, but A. R. Kennedy took the position in 1904 and held it for the next seven highly successful seasons, through 1910. Kennedy's overall coaching record at Kansas was 52–9–4. This still ranks as the most wins for any Kansas head coach, and puts him fourth at the school in terms of winning percentage (). Kansas Coaching Records Kennedy's best season was 1908, when the Jayhawks posted the school's second ever undefeated season (9–0) and won the school's first major conference championship, in the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association. KU has not had another perfect season since 1908. Kennedy was also one of the best performing coaches for Kansas in the Border War (as of 2007 called "Border Showdown") between Kansas and Missouri, going 4–1–2 (.714) against MU as a coach and 7–1–2 (.800) against MU cumulatively as a coach and player.KU Athletics Football news
Kennedy's long tenure was followed by another period of rapid turnover in coaches, with seven head coaches for KU in the next ten seasons. The most successful of these was Herman Olcott, who had a three-year tenure as head coach from 1915 to 1917, posting a record of 16–7–1 (). Basketball coach Phog Allen also served one year as head football coach during this era, with a record of 5–2–1 in 1920. Potsy Clark finally returned some stability to the position, serving as KU's head football coach for five seasons, from 1921 to 1925. Although Clark would later go on to find success as an NFL head coach, at KU he amassed a 16–17–6 record in his five seasons and left the school as the first coach with an overall losing record since John Outland in 1901. Football innovator Bill Hargiss – one of the first in the sport to use the huddle and forward pass – was hired as KU head coach in 1928. Hargiss coached the team to a Big Six championship in 1930, but could not sustain success and was fired only two games into the 1932 season, after the Jayhawks lost at home to Oklahoma, 21–6. Hargiss recorded an overall mark of 18–16–2 () as KU head coach. Through the end of Hargiss's tenure in 1932 the Jayhawks football program had registered a great deal of success, with only four of the first twenty coaches at KU suffering losing records. Beginning with Hargiss's successor Adrian Lindsey's 23–30–8 mark at KU, four of the next seven coaches at KU would post losing records.
KU alum Adrian Lindsey was hired by his alma mater as head football coach in the middle of the 1932 season, taking over after the mid-season firing of Bill Hargiss. Lindsey led the Jayhawks to a 4–2 record during his first partial season. Lindsey's teams thereafter struggled to find success on the football field, posting an overall record of 23–30–8 during Lindsey's time as head coach. Lindsey was replaced after the 1938 season. In 1939, Gwinn Henry, formerly head coach of the rival Missouri Tigers from 1923 to 1931, was hired to take over the struggling Jayhawks football program. In four seasons at KU, Henry failed to find much success on the field, going a dismal 9–27 – the worst record of any KU head coach to that time. Because of the struggles, Henry was fired after the 1942 season. Henry Shenk was hired to replace Gwinn Henry but failed to turn around the Jayhawks football program, which by this time had fallen to the bottom of the Big Six Conference. Shenk's teams fared better than his predecessors, but failed to post a winning record in any of his three seasons. Shenk's final record at KU was 11–16–3.
Though he was KU's head coach for only two years, George Sauer had an immediate impact on the program and was the most successful Jayhawks coach since A. R. Kennedy. Both of his KU teams won a share of the Big Six Conference, posting records of 7–2–1 and 8–1–2. His 1947 team was invited to KU's first bowl game, the Orange Bowl. Despite falling 20–14 to Georgia Tech in the bowl game, KU finished the 1947 season ranked No. 12 in the AP Poll – the program's first appearance in a final poll. Sauer departed after his successful 1947 season to accept the head football coach position at Navy. His final record at KU was 15–3–3, giving him the highest winning percentage of any KU coach since A. R. Kennedy. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame as a player in 1954.
Jules Sikes came to Kansas from his post as defensive line coach at Georgia. Sikes had success at KU, in particular 7–3 seasons in 1948 and 1952, 6–4 in 1950 and 8–2 in 1951 that included a No. 20 ranking in the final Coaches' Poll. Despite several winning years, a 2–8 season in 1953 sealed his fate as head coach. He was fired after the dismal season. His final record with the Jayhawks was 35–25.
Mid-century Chuck Mather was hired in 1954 as the 27th head football coach for the Kansas Jayhawks. He started his tenure with an 0–10 season in 1954, the first winless season in KU history. Mather continued to struggle at KU, leaving after the 1957 season with an overall coaching record at Kansas of 11–26–3, ranking him 18th at Kansas in terms of total wins and 34th in terms of winning percentage.