Has it been shared on how much the Big 12 will receive in bowl revenue this year?

OFFENSE:
Hadley Panzer - 79
Cooper Beebe - 79
Hayden Gillum - 79
Christian Duffie - 79
Ben Sinnott - 77
Will Howard - 74
KT Leveston - 74
Phillip Brooks - 63
Kade Warner - 58
Deuce Vaughn - 57
Malik Knowles - 41
Sammy Wheeler - 40
DJ Giddens - 25
RJ Garcia - 16
Dawson Delforge - 5
Jadon Jackson - 5
Adrian Martinez - 5
Christian Moore - 3
Jordan Schippers - 3
Seth Porter - 2
Carver Willis - 2

DEFENSE:
VJ Payne - 56
Drake Cheatum - 54
Josh Hayes - 54
Julius Brents - 48
Austin Moore - 45
Felix Anudike-Uzomah - 40
Daniel Green - 37
Eli Huggins - 36
Brendan Mott - 34
Khalid Duke - 33
Jacob Parrish - 28
Ekow Boye-Doe - 28
Des Purnell - 19
Nick Allen - 19
Nate Matlack - 18
Robert Hentz - 14
Cody Stufflebean - 10
Jaylen Pickle - 9
Jake Clifton - 6
Gavin Forsha - 5
Jordan Wright - 5
Uso Seumalo - 5
Omar Daniels - 5
Keenan Garber - 5
Damian Ilalio - 2
Jace Friesen - 1

I hope everyone comes back and I love our cats. But Howard better get better not a good showing today. I do think we played the best team in the country so a good measuring stick. Better decisions before half keeps the score closer.

If the OL comes back, who transfers out?

I’ve got to give the staff a break because I think perhaps they spent more time recruiting than preparing. That’s fine - future thinking. But OMG you don’t have to change your philosophies just because it’s Alabama. Play them straight up, you’re actually good enough to do that. As is, you appear that you don’t think we can play with an Alabama. Some of that looked desperately drawn up in the dirt.

Coaching wise also, let’s get the gambling head coach and the overly conservative OC Klein on the same page. Staff looked foolish in that sense.

After watching (and hearing) of KU's historic 6-7 season, I'm curious if people think KU can maintain this?

Lots of news about KU in the Liberty Bowl today, not a word about the Cats in the Sugar Bowl.

It was fun to watch. These guys have resilience. Had to watch on my phone since we were in New Orleans.

If we could have one guy from last years team added to this team my choice would be Mark Smith. I think he would have fit well.

Starting this early as I'm sure anticipation for today's game is high. Mason and I are settled in at the Super Dome, and K-State's players have already started to inhabit the field for stretches and basic ball drills. Below is my linked Twitter thread with a couple of different stories I wrote this week, including today's game preview.

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No David N'Guessan per the TV broadcast, undisclosed injury that happened in practice

Three Positives:

1. Deuce Vaughn: The K-State running back played in what could be his final game as a Wildcat and ripped off a big 88-yard touchdown run to put the Wildcats up 10-0. It was the biggest play allowed by Nick Saban since he had been at Alabama. Vaughn had an injury scare, but came back into the game and had a strong day for the Wildcats. If it was the last time for him, one hell of a career and one of the best Cats of all time.
2. Kade Warner: Early in the game, Warner made a lot of plays and fought for extra yardage that gave the Wildcats’ offense a chance to score and move the ball. He even did it through what looked like holds or pass interference no calls. Warner’s two years at K-State were important and the offense was better because of him this year. It will be interesting to see who can take his role next season. Also, Warner got to finish his season as a conference champ and in a NY6 bowl. Where were those nasty Husker fans?
3. You got Alabama’s best shot: Maybe I am alone in this, but I would rather show up and get somebody’s best shot than them discount me and not give you the best effort. Alabama had to show up and play their best and most complete game of the season against the Wildcats and they did that. It sucks that the outcome was what it was, but K-State forced Alabama to take them seriously and make big play after big play.

Three Negatives:

1. Corners: A positive very easily could have been how the linebackers and defensive line played. I loved what they showed on Saturday and they halted the Alabama run defense for the most part. This forced the Crimson Tide to go to the air quite a bit. Something I highlighted as a possible point of advantage for the Wildcats. Unfortunately, the corners were not up to the task. Alabama’s receivers torched Ekow Boye-Doe and Julius Brents with speed and athleticism all day. The drive before half featured a tough go for Boye-Doe and then Brents gave up a touchdown on the opening drive of the second half.
2. Klieman’s over-aggressiveness: I don’t hate going for it on fourth and goal before half, I don’t disagree with the timeout, I hated the onside kick. Since none of them work, they have to be negatives. Going 0/3 cost K-State the opportunity to stay in a closer game and see what happens. They went for broke, and they broke.
3. Special Teams: Bad field position on returns, a failed onside kick, and two weird punts from Ty Zentner that backed up and went for low yardage meant that special teams was a net negative for K-State today. K-State needed special teams to pop in a good way for a shot at a win, and they didn’t even make it out of the game even.

It sucks, I won’t sugarcoat it. But this team was still great this season and the experience was a good one. Things still look really good for the Cats in the future.

PS: Would have liked more Adrian once the game was put away and a curtain call chance for Deuce.

Chris Klieman starts by thanking the K-State fanbase for coming down to New Orleans the way they did, citing about 10,000 people at the pep rally last night.

Blessed to be able to go to the Sugar Bowl. I have a couple of tickets in Section 3, twelve rows up. Free if you promise to go.

Email me at bigksufan@aol.com. I can text them to you. You'll owe me a beer sometime.

RKR

There is an excellent article on ESPN regarding Klieman's climb from the FCS to a Power 5 head coaching position.

That means the K-State offensive line can choose to “run it back” next year and stay completely intact as a blocking unit in 2023. TOP VIDEOS × What are the odds that will happen? Higher than you might think.

“We definitely have been in talks,” Beebe said. “We have sat down at dinner a couple times and talked about it. There’s nothing that has been ironed out, and it’s still up in the air. But we are definitely in talks. If one of us comes back I think it’s an all type of deal.”

Made it down here and been walking around lots of Cats on the ground already!! I believe there will be plenty of purple in the Dome!!

I wanted to quickly throw this up today before I got busy with family stuff again.

I appreciate all of you that have stuck around and given us a chance, we will continue to find ways to improve ourselves and cover the Cats for you all. I have had a blast in the almost four months that we have been doing this now and look forward to the next couple of weeks and months with the excitement of the Sugar Bowl and conference play in basketball firing up. As always, feel free to reach out and send me a message with suggestions or critiques, I want to ensure that myself, Alec and Gabe are covering K-State in the way that is best for all of you.

This week will be pretty heavy with Sugar Bowl coverage, but we will still have postgame coverage from basketball on Saturday night. Then our focus will shift to basketball and highlighting more of what is going on with 2024 football recruiting, as well as any of the transfer or late period adds the Wildcats are looking at.

So again, thank you all for continuing to follow the Cats with EMAW Online and Rivals, Merry Christmas, and be sure to let us all know the great Cat gear you got for Christmas. And if you don't celebrate Christmas, that's okay too as long as you are a K-Stater, enjoy whatever you have going on today. EMAW and see you in NOLA later this week.

I know there will be those on this board who will disagree, but this is one EMAW who is quite glad that the Sooners ended up with Venerables not us.

What is the ticket allotment for the Sugar Bowl? Estimate of K-State fans at Sugar Bowl.