Yellow flags dropping on a football field are like rain drops falling on your head: You never know how many will fall.

Not that it matters.

Raindrops don’t predict rain-gauge totals and penalties are not an accurate predictor of outcomes.

In public, Kansas University coach Mark Mangino has been moaning most of the season about too many flags. But the reality is that penalties don’t mean squat if you’re winning. All in all, they’re an inexact barometer.

Mangino, for instance, was assistant head coach of the Kansas State football team in 1998. That was the year the Wildcats won all 11 regular season games, then dropped a double overtime decision to Texas A&M in the Big 12 Conference championship game and a 37-34 heartbreaker to Purdue in the Alamo Bowl.

That ’98 K-State club also was the most penalized team in Big 12 history. Those ‘Cats were flagged 118 times in 13 games.

Did penalties hurt K-State that season? Only when they lost. K-State was guilty of 14 infractions that cost 125 yards in the Alamo Bowl, and the ‘Cats were saddled with 13 whistles worth 110 yards in the A&M defeat. That’s an unsightly 27 penalties in two games, yet the ‘Cats also were flagged 91 times in their 11 regular-season victories.

Saturday in Norman, Okla., a dozen of the flags that flew were directed at Kansas and cost the Jayhawks 109 yards. How much of an effect did they have on Oklahoma’s 41-10 win? Not that much, really … not when you consider that three weeks earlier KU had knocked off Kansas State, 31-28, with virtually the same penalty numbers (13 for 109 yards).

And how about last month’s Kansas-Texas Tech game? The Red Raiders won, 31-30, overcoming an eye-popping 14 whistles that cost them 114 yards.

Still, when you lose as many close games as Kansas has — three defeats by a total of 10 points — negatives are magnified, so the 2004 Jayhawks indeed have been guilty of too many rules infractions.

6Sports video: KU played hard in the first half, but OU pulled away by the end Mangino bemoans team’s abundance of penalties Hear Mark: Oct. 25 Big 12 teleconference Hear McCarney: Oct. 25 Big 12 teleconference Hawks Football Forecaster — Week 8

At the current pace — KU is averaging about 101/2 flags a game — the Jayhawks will fall only two penalties shy of K-State’s league record, and that doesn’t count KU’s flagging — no pun intended — hopes of earning a bowl berth. The ’98 Wildcats had 118 penalties in 13 games while Kansas projects to 116 in just 11 games.

Oh, and if you’re wondering, Kansas already is just 12 flags away from surpassing the entire total of infractions compiled by last year’s Tangerine Bowl team.

Is there one particular area where the Jayhawks have been most penalty-prone? Not really. As coaches like to say, it’s been a team effort. Three of the 12 penalties at Oklahoma were for delay of game. That’s three too many, of course. The offense also had an illegal procedure call and a holding penalty (on wide receiver Mark Simmons).

Only three of the penalties went against the defense — two for pass interference and one for an inadvertent face mask. That’s not a relatively high number, but the three whistled against the special teams were way above par.

Twice Kansas was whistled for illegal blocks in the back on punt returns. The other whistle involving special teams was against Kenneth Thompson for interfering with an OU player’s opportunity to make a fair catch, a call that led directly to the 12th flag of the day — a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct toot against Mangino, who was standing on the sideline right in front of the punt reception and apparently reacted in an ungracious way to side judge Freeman Johns’ evaluation of the developed scenario.

When push comes to shove, the ultimate piece of evidence that proves penalties are deceptive occurred Oct. 9, 1999, when Kansas State established a Big 12 single-game record by being docked a stunning 18 times for an astonishing 162 yards in a game against Kansas.

Final score: Kansas State 50, Kansas 9.