KU Football Moment of Zen: For Aqib

Since he's had to hear about Jordy Nelson all week ... good reminder from Talib though on the ending of the game.

Mark Mangino vs the South: Points Delta Study

This chart is part of a series examining the points delta per season (points scored minus points allowed) relative to Mark Mangino. The series starts off with the year prior to a coach taking a job. The comparison is the year in the program not by calendar year.

Today, Mark Mangino gets put up against the south division. I'm not sure what I've learned from this one except that OU and Texas have been pretty good under Bob Stoops and Mack Brown. I guess looking at this one and the North chart from last week, I might also add that you need to be wary of a coach that takes a huge drop in year one.

Monday Recycle: Double B to Miami

Bryce Brown to Miami
Rivals has five-star RB Bryce Brown already making a verbal commitment to Miami. I'm not too concerned about the loss as a specific need for KU, but from an overall recruiting perspective, I'd like to fast forward to the point where we can retain a local five-star player. I also need to offer my apologies as we hosted a little roundball watch party on Saturday for the old tailgate crew. They reported this news to me on Saturday and I said no way. Wrong again.

NFL Combine Profiles
Marcus Henry -- "Will be characterized by some as an overachieving one-year wonder playing against really poor Big 12 defenses"
Will the subtle Nebraska bashing ever end?

Aqib Talib -- "Could be more physical at his size"
Maybe, but I saw AT sacrifice himself against RBs in the open field a few times. I was really impressed with the way he tackled in the open field this year. 

Anthony Collins -- "Not a finesse player -- he likes to mix it up and give a strong punch. ... Likes to put his man on the ground"
This is true.

Derek Fine -- "Very good receiver who runs precise routes and does not drop many balls"

James McClinton -- "Flat-out unblockable at times, disrupting the play even if he doesn't make the tackle"
That's what I remember

Anthony Collins Quote From the NFL Combine

AC got a mention in the ESPN NFL Hashmarks blog today:

Kansas tackle Anthony Collins drew relatively little interest from recruiters in part because he played only one year of football in high school. "I thought I could play basketball," he said. "It turns out I couldn't jump worth nothing." Vertical-jump testing for offensive linemen is Friday.

KU Football Moment of Zen -- Orange Bowl Video

Caught a link for this on the gridiron board this morning. Well done.

Mark Mangino vs the North: Points Delta Study

Last summer when it was a little more difficult to see progress for Kansas football program, I put together a series of charts that demonstrated KU's improvement under Mark Mangino. The charts were all relative to Mark Mangino and compared annual team points delta (points scored vs points allowed). One season later and a study like this isn't really necessary. Still, I found the data interesting and thought I'd update it for the year.

Future charts will compare Mangino against the current south coaches and also against former KU coaches. For the North chart I've also included Bill Snyder since he took on a building project similar to Mangino's task. I find it interesting that the Mangino and Snyder chart patterns are similar.

Please note prior year indicates the points delta for that program the year before the coach took over the position. I felt that gave a more valid starting point. Hopefully, it's clear that 1, 2, 3 ... indicate the year in the program relative to each coach.

Joe Semple & Sebelius: Monday Recycle

Offensive lineman Joe Semple (6-4/302) out of Mundelein, Illinois will walk on / it's been discussed on the boards for over a week. Rivals has him as two-star, while Scout ranks him as a one-star. The two profiles vary on his height/weight. Here's an official link confirming the commitment: Daily Herald.

Kathleen Sebelius makes good on her bet / Channel 5 has some video. You gotta love her moxy.

Baby Jay on NCAA 2009 / the message boards were touting this opportunity to vote for Baby Jay to take the cover spot on next summer's version of the college football video game. A little tour around the site indicates that NCAA 2009 will not be available for the old X-Box. Looks like it's time for an upgrade for me. What a waste. There's really nothing wrong with the game play on my old X-Box. I guess it might be time to look into the Wii -- my goal of always being one generation behind on platforms may be fading away. Hey, maybe I should really stick it to Bill Gates and pick up a PlayStation 2 (the new version will be available on that platform).

Update on Tuesday, February 19, 2008 at 12:27PM by DJ Goodwin

http://www.easports.com/ncaa09/

KU Football Moment of Zen - Scanned Memorabilia

Button purchased at the 2005 Fort Worth Bowl by sister-in-law. I'm not much of a button-wearer, but I did enjoy finding this in my recent treasure excavation. Two years in a new house and I just now found all of my KU football memorabilia. Your weekly Moment of Zen is really going to rock now.

KU Spring Game: April 12

Ryan Wood reported in his Sawin' Wood blog today that KU would start spring practice March 12 and hold the Spring Game on April 12. No official word from the KU site yet on what practices will be held open for the public.

Spring Dates to Remember

03/08 -- Allen Fieldhouse Celebration
03/12 -- Spring Practice Starts
04/12 -- Spring Game

Reinvent Yourself

Hardcore readers may have noticed that a lot of the Hawk Digest resources recently disappeared. There's no need to get into the gory details, but let's just say we leaned to the side of caution. The good thing is that has presented the opportunity to re-think the mission of Hawk Digest and maybe streamline some resources. It's all still in the "brainstorming" stage. In the meantime, I'm pleased to announce that I've brought back the Big 12 Blogs page and have added a news feed page (KU Football News). You'll find the links in the left column. The news feed still needs a little work (I may have to consider dropping some feeds that continue to filter in KU hoops). Still, it's a page under development and it won't take long before it eclipses the old football portal page.

The bottom line -- Hawk Digest is as strong as ever, looking forward and ready for the spring game.

Tuesday Recycle

Audio for Jayhawk Football Fans
I used to feed this into the portal page, but in case you haven't checked it out the KLWN website has an excellent line-up of KU sports interviews. At the top of the list right now is a Clint Bowen interview.

Joe Bob Clements
Mark Mangino didn't wait too long to find a d-line coach. Last week, former KSU defensive lineman Joe Bob Clements joined the KU staff. I like the fact that KU filled the coaching spots quickly. It minimizes the distractions and gets us focused on the 2008 season. (Real news link: KUsports.com)

“Joe Bob is defined by his hard work and tenacity. We will be a very sound, technical defensive line with a great deal of toughness.”
--Mangino

New Date for AFH Celebration
In order to accomodate the players going to the NFL combine, KU has moved the Allen Fieldhouse Celebration to March 8 at 7:30 p.m. The event was originally scheduled for February 23. We're still looking for dates for the start of spring practice and the spring game.

Final Big 12 Recruiting Class Rankings

The official Rivals results are out on team rankings for the 2008 recruiting class. Rivals has KU as ninth place in the Big 12 based on their points system. That seems a little low after an Orange Bowl appearance. KU signed a smaller class of 20 players so that skews things a bit. If you take the average star ranking by Rivals, KU performs quite a bit better:

Source: JayhawkSlant.com