Led by a fiery coach and undersized QB, Kansas is 8-0

Just 5-11, Kansas sophomore quarterback Todd Reesing has played big in leading the Jayhawks to an 8-0 start this season. Icon SMI

MAILBAG Submit a comment or question for Aditi. Your name: Your e-mail address: Your home town: Enter your question:

The snake wrangling bit was supposed to be a joke. Kansas' sports information folks had given quarterback Todd Reesing a super-long personal history form and by the end of it, he was kind of tired and kind of unimpressed with the person he'd described. So next to "hobbies," Reesing figured: why not?

"I guess I thought it would be pretty cool if people thought I could pick up snakes with my bare hands," Reesing said. "Like I was tough or something."

Maybe a quarterback who's listed at 5-foot-11 ("He'd be 5-11 if he was Austin Powers and wore those platform shoes," Jayhawks fullback Brandon McAnderson said) and 200 pounds ("If he weighs 200 pounds," Colorado quarterback Cody Hawkins said, "I'll give you my left foot.") has to worry about that.

But not this one. Not today. Led by Reesing (1,985 yards, 17 TDs), Kansas is 8-0. Usually at this time of year the talk in Lawrence has turned to basketball, but there was Jayhawks hoops coach Bill Self on Monday, drawing fewer reporters to his press briefing than football coach Mark Mangino did to his. Of course, Mangino has Reesing, a sophomore out of Austin, Texas, who threw for 6,500 yards and 70 touchdowns as a high-schooler, but only ended up a Jayhawk because his godfather's son's wife's dad slid a tape into Mangino's VCR.

In a season of crazy upsets, Reesing and these Jayhawks have cobbled together one of the craziest seasons and are one of four unbeaten teams in the nation. The Jayhawks knocked off Texas A&M in College Station last week, they're in the driver's seat in the Big 12 North and they're doing it all behind a kid who thought he'd have to fake being tough.

"That's crazy," McAnderson said. "He's a smaller guy, but of everybody on our offense who has to take hits, Todd Reesing definitely takes them the best."

Then again, that may be because most of the Jayhawks don't take hits so much as deliver them. Especially McAnderson. A chubby teenager, he spent his first three years at Kansas as a fullback. This year he's Mangino's leading rusher, ringing up 183 yards and two touchdowns last Saturday at A&M, pushing like a bulldozer, flinging Aggies every which way. And just like Reesing, McAnderson was never supposed to dice up Big 12 teams.

"I think that stuff's a long time ago now," McAnderson said of the recruiting interest (read: none) he drew at Lawrence High. He knows he ended up at Kansas pretty much because Mangino's son was his high school teammate and the coach couldn't ignore him, but hey, he said, "It all worked out, right?"

This Kansas team is full of stories like this, players Mangino took a chance on. Just like he takes chances on gameday. Already this year, Mangino's sent Reesing down as a gunner on a punt and put in his backup quarterback as a punter. He played a whole series a couple weeks ago with a four-wideout set where the four wideouts were a corner, a backup QB and two back-up receivers. Every game, it's some funky tweak and his players, Reesing said, "think it's fun."

"If you've got athletes, use them," McAnderson said, also shrugging at the suggestion that some of those formations are just a tad loopy.

And yet, the real point here is that Kansas doesn't actually have a ton of those uber-elite, five-star athletes. This isn't 22 blue-chippers overwhelming opponents with their athleticism. Corner Aqib Talib could be an All-America and Reesing was just named an O'Brien semifinalist, but the Jayhawks haven't once this year had the Big 12's offensive or defensive player of the week. There aren't any real stars and if anyone actually acts like one, well, we all know what Mangino thinks about that.

(As an aside, when Reesing was asked if he and his teammates sat in their dorm rooms, replayed that video and maybe laughed, the quarterback sighed and said, "I don't want to get myself in trouble. Can we just say it wasn't a big deal?")

1 of 2