photo by: Jenny Butler/Illinois Athletics

Illinois defensive end Alex Bray takes on the Kansas offensive line on Saturday, Sept. 7, 2024, in Champaign, Ill.

Topeka — Coming out of spring practice, the Kansas football team had a wide range of skill sets at defensive end and an increasingly versatile group of players providing depth at the position.

One thing the Jayhawks didn’t have was the same kind of size and length that two of its players provided on the strong side of the defensive line in 2024.

“I think what Dylan Wudke gave us a year ago, Jereme Robinson’s size, we thought we were lacking a little bit there,” head coach Lance Leipold said at the Otto Schnellbacher Classic on Monday, “that if you had the opportunity to add someone (you would).”

Presumptive strong-side starter Justice Finkley is a bulky, powerful player listed at 6-foot-2 and 250 pounds, but in its top two options from last season — both of whom graduated, along with third-stringer Ronald McGee — KU had 6-foot-3, 255 pounds in Robinson and 6-foot-4, 260 pounds in Wudke.

So, during the spring portal, it got ahold of rising junior Alex Bray, an Illinois transfer who at 6-foot-4 and 270 pounds was big enough to play inside at times with the Illini.

“Alex was somebody that came to our camp, somebody we had recruited out of high school, played against him a year ago,” Leipold said. “He was playing a little bit more defensive tackle than at defensive end in the scheme at Illinois. We think he’ll be a great fit for us.”

The native of Chesterfield, Missouri, started three of 13 games for the Illini last year and recorded 20 tackles. His 462 career snaps, per Pro Football Focus, are a quantity not too far off Finkley’s total from Texas. Those two figure to be the primary two strong-side run-stopping options, particularly if redshirt freshman Dakyus Brinkley slides back over to the weak side after training on both ends in the spring, a move that would make more sense in light of Bai Jobe’s transfer-portal departure for Miami (Ohio).

On that note, Bray wasn’t the only defensive end KU added in the spring portal window; he wasn’t even in the first, and in fact the first overall transfer the Jayhawks acquired was Leroy Harris III, who will be moving up from FCS-level Chattanooga after a strong freshman season as a rotational piece.

Harris, the son of a former NFL lineman, recovered three fumbles and recorded 11 tackles in 302 snaps and was named to his conference’s all-freshman team. He’s lighter, at 230 pounds, but stands 6-foot-5.

“Tre’s a guy that we just saw with great length and upside (who) kind of fits our personality of development,” Leipold said, “and a guy that’s got a very bright future.”

Harris could potentially slot in on the weak side behind Brinkley and the starter Dean Miller, a returning all-conference pick. Also in the mix is a fellow young transfer who may need time to develop in Caleb Redd, who arrived in the winter, as well as veteran Dylan Brooks.