Everything you need to know for Coastal Carolina’s opener at Kansas on Saturday

Saturday’s game

Who: Coastal Carolina (0-0) at Kansas (0-0)

When: 10 p.m. (Eastern)

Where: David Booth Kansas Memorial Stadium, Lawrence, Kansas

TV: Fox Sports 1 (FS1)

Radio: WRNN 99.5 FM

Online audio: http://portal.stretchinternet.com/coastal/

Live stats: Through www.Coastal.statbroadcast.com and GameTracker

Last meeting

CCU 12-7 on Sept. 7, 2019, in Lawrence, Kansas

Coastal Carolina

Strength: Defensive front seven

Weakness: Secondary

Kansas

Strength: Offensive skill positions

Weakness: Defensive line, secondary

Key matchup

Coastal Carolina’s defensive front seven vs. Kansas’ offensive line: With the strength of Coastal’s defense and team being its experienced and talented front seven, and inexperience in the secondary, the Chants will have to win the battle at the line of scrimmage to win pretty much all season. The front seven will have to bottle up running back Pooka Williams, who has amassed more than 1,000 yards in each of the past two seasons, and take time away from what will likely be two quarterbacks who are replacing 2019 graduated starter Carter Stanley. The Jayhawks have talented receivers if the quarterbacks are able to deliver the ball. CCU’s front seven includes senior defensive ends Tarron Jackson and Jeffrey Gunter, senior lineman C.J. Brewer, and senior linebackers Silas Kelly and Teddy Gallagher. Kansas returns experience at the center and guard positions but is replacing both tackles on the offensive line, so there may be opportunities to get pressure from the edges.

Players to watch

Coastal Carolina

Senior running back C.J. Marable (5-10, 200): He does it all for the Chants. In 2019, he rushed for 1,104 yards and 11 touchdowns on 204 carries, and was second on the team in receptions with 38 for 295 yards and three scores. And he’s a candidate to return kicks.

Junior receiver Jaivon Heiligh (6-2, 190): He led the team last year with 46 receptions and 497 receiving yards and has caught a pass in 15 consecutive games dating back to his freshman season.

Senior linebacker Teddy Gallagher (6-1, 230): The Los Angeles native led the team and ranked 10th in the Sun Belt with 88 total tackles last season in 11 games, including 3.5 for a loss of yards.

Kansas

Junior running back Pooka Williams (5-10, 170): Enters his junior season with 2,186 yards rushing and 10 touchdowns on 364 carries for an average of 6 yards per carry.

Senior receiver Andrew Parchment (6-2, 180): He was second in the Big 12 with 831 receiving yards in his first season at Kansas with 65 receptions and seven TDs.

Junior linebacker Dru Prox (6-1, 215): Led the Jayhawks with 39 tackles and had two sacks through four games before missing the rest of the 2019 season with an injury.

He said it

“I think the rebuilding is a constant but comfortable position to be in. I think we’ve kind of identified things we’re going to do and things that are important to us, and I think the view of what is our culture is pretty sound. . . . I think our team is a little bit deeper, a little bit more talented, and probably for that reason a little bit more ready to play.” – Kansas coach Les Miles

“I think we’re prepared and certainly Coastal is a quality football team, and we don’t take quality football teams lightly.” – Miles

“It’s a blessing just to be able to play football in general. We’re all thankful and blessed to be able to be out here and playing football again.” – CCU senior linebacker Silas Kelly

Scouting report

Les Miles begins his second season as Kansas head coach after a 3-9 campaign in 2019. That included a 12-7 loss to Coastal in the second game of the season for CCU’s first ever win over a Power Five conferences opponent.

Kansas offensive coordinator/QB coach Brent Dearmon took over the OC duties on Oct. 6 last year, a month after Kansas gained just 280 yards in its loss to Coastal. His offense averaged 402 yards per game, elevating the season average to 377 per game, which was the most at Kansas since 2009. He led his alma mater, Bethel University, to the nation’s highest scoring average at any level as head coach in 2018.

The Jayhawks are among the Big 12’s most talented teams at the offensive skill positions. In addition to Williams, who gained 99 yards on 22 carries last year against Coastal, Kansas returns two of the top five receivers in the Big 12 in 2019. Parchment was second with 831 yards on 65 receptions and Stephon Robinson Jr. (5-10, 180) was fifth with 727 yards on 45 catches, and they combined for 15 TDs.

Senior Kwame Lassiter II (6-0, 175) was third on the team last year with 34 receptions for 352 yards, so Kansas returns more than 3,000 yards from 2019 at the running back and receiver positions – or 70 percent of its rushing yards and 84 percent of its receiving yards.

Stanley, who threw for nearly 2,700 yards with 24 TDs and 11 interceptions while completing 61 percent of his passes, has graduated and moved on. Miles has been coy about naming a starting QB for the game, as has CCU coach Jamey Chadwell.

Senior Thomas MacVittie (6-5, 225) and junior Miles Kendrick (5-10, 205) are Kansas’ primary candidates and could both play. MacVittie is a pro-style QB who saw little playing time as a JUCO transfer last year, and Kendrick is more of a running threat and also has very little experience.

Chadwell hasn’t named a starter at QB but it will likely be junior Fred Payton, who led the team in 2019 with 119 completions, 187 attempts, 1,421 passing yards, 12 passing TDs, seven interceptions and 1,602 total yards of offense.

Kansas will undoubtedly be intent on stopping Marable, who scored both of Coastal’s touchdowns against the Jayhawks last year and had 148 yards rushing on 24 carries and a 20-yard receiving TD. On defense, the Jayhawks have a solid linebacker corps but several new faces along the defensive front and in the secondary.

Chadwell said Wednesday that Coastal will be without at least four players because of coronavirus testing protocols, while Kansas associate athletic director for public relations Dan Beckler told the Kansas City Star on Wednesday that only three Jayhawks players are current positive cases, though the number of players in quarantine because of contact tracing was not reported.

“We’re not a team that’s riddled with those issues, and I don’t think there is any real trepidation,” Miles said Monday. “. . . We want to play. This is our sport and this is our time.”

Notes

▪Williams is one of just two Kansas players to rush for more than 2,000 yards in his first two seasons. The other is legend Gale Sayers (1962-63).

▪Miles is in his 39th season as a college or NFL coach. He won the 2007 BCS national championship at LSU and was the national coach of the year in 2011 when his Tigers went 13-1 and lost to Alabama in the BCS national championship game.

▪Coastal is seeking its first winning record as an FBS program in its fourth season as a member of the Sun Belt Conference, going 3-9 in 2017 and 5-7 in each of the past two years. Yet the Chants have gotten off to fast starts. They won their opener in 2017 against Massachusetts and started each of the past two seasons 3-1.

Line

Kansas -6.5

Prediction

Kansas 24, Coastal Carolina 17: The Jayhawks have had plenty of time to focus on the Chants this time around and will be motivated by last year’s loss, and they should have a little too much talent on offense.

This story was originally published September 11, 2020 at 6:00 AM with the headline "Everything you need to know for Coastal Carolina’s opener at Kansas on Saturday."