LJWorld.com

A popular opinion heading into this football season espoused the belief that this Kansas University team would be just as good as the 2007 version, but would not be able to duplicate its 12-1 record because that team played a softer conference schedule than this one.

It sounded reasonable enough at the time, but it has played out wrong on both counts. This team can’t compare on offense or defense to the Orange Bowl champions, as it turned out, and it doesn’t play a tougher schedule.

As the ’07 Jayhawks won 11 weeks in a row without losing, skeptics repeated a qualifier each week: Name the best team KU has beaten. None of those victories came against teams ranked in the Top 25 as of the final week of the regular season.

KU was ranked second when it lost to third-ranked Missouri and faded to eighth heading into the Orange Bowl. Strangely, after defeating fifth-ranked Virginia Tech in the Orange Bowl, Kansas moved up just one spot to seventh. That team fought the overrated label much of the season, but the fact is, history should remember the ’07 Jayhawks as underrated and worthy of a final ranking of third in the nation, four places higher than they finished.

The KU team that featured All-Americans Aqib Talib and Anthony Collins and second-teamer James McClinton would be 9-0 so far against this year’s schedule.

Two year later, Kansas has a 5-4 record. None of those nine opponents can be found in the Top 25.

Both teams went 4-0 in nonconference games, and both will have faced one team in the top five of the rankings, once the Texas game has been played. Remove Missouri from the ’07 schedule and Texas from this year’s and compare the two schedules. They are about even. Oklahoma State two years ago was roughly as good as Oklahoma this season. The Texas A&M of two years ago is almost as good as this year’s Texas Tech team. Colorado was better then, Nebraska better now.

Offensively, the ’07 team was a better running, passing and blocking team than this year’s. A healthier Todd Reesing averaged 7.83 yards per attempt, threw 33 touchdowns and seven interceptions and had a rating of 148.9. This year, Reesing’s numbers are 7.27, 17, eight and 136.5. Brandon McAnderson’s ability to make tacklers miss, a healthier Jake Sharp and better run-blocking enabled the team to average 4.8 yards per rush. This year, the number is 3.8.

Defensively, McClinton consistently was in the opposing backfield, which helped middle linebacker Joe Mortensen have a huge season. Cornerback Talib covered so much of the field himself, making life easier for the rest of the secondary.

KU coach Mark Mangino is fond of saying all things are correctable, but he wasn’t in denial shortly after Saturday’s 17-10 loss to Kansas State.

“Well, certainly we don’t have a sense that we’re in control of things when you lose four in a row,” he said. “But I’m in the locker room with our players. I know our kids pretty well, and quickly their attention shifted to (Nebraska). ... The players unanimously agreed they wanted to get a win for the seniors, their last game at Memorial Stadium.”

Here’s guessing that this time the score won’t be Kansas 76, Nebraska 39.