The following is a letter published by K-State Athletic Director John Currie in it’s entirety, published on ksu.edu.

“Dear K-State Nation,

Thank you for your patience as we worked through our 2016 football schedule. Today, I am pleased to announce that we have finalized the non-conference portion with the addition of a home-and-home series with Stanford of the Pac-12 Conference, which will begin next year in a marquee nationally-televised matchup on September 2 in Palo Alto. Stanford will make a return trip to Manhattan on September 4, 2021.

Following the opener at Stanford, we will host Florida Atlantic on September 17 and Missouri State on September 24 at Bill Snyder Family Stadium to close out the non-conference slate.

With more than 7,500 friends and alumni in the state of California, and our game at Stanford next season taking place over Labor Day weekend, this series gives the K-State Nation a great opportunity to again showcase its national reputation as one of America’s top traveling fan bases. Time and television network designation for the game will be announced at a later date.

The Stanford agreement continues a trend of marquee matchups for the Wildcats as we have already played recent series with Auburn (2007, 2014), UCLA (2009, 2010) and Miami (Fla.) (2011, 2012), while future series with Mississippi State (2018, 2019) and Vanderbilt (2017, 2020) have previously been announced. The Wildcats and Cardinal have never met on the football field heading into next season’s opener.

The conference portion of the schedule will be released as soon as it is finalized by the Big 12. The 2016 season will be one in which K-State will host four league games at Bill Snyder Family Stadium, which coupled with the two home non-conference games will mean a rare occurrence of less than seven home games for the Wildcats. We are the only Big 12 Conference program to play seven or more games in its home stadium in each of the last five years, and following six home games in 2016, we expect to have at least seven home games annually from 2017-2021.

We worked every possible angle to find a seventh home game, but with just 11 months remaining before the 2016 season the Stanford series became an attractive option that gives us an opportunity to further our program and University on a national level. This accomplishes our goal of having at least 11 FBS opponents on the schedule each season and ensures that we will have a high-visibility peer conference opponent on our schedule for the next six years, including two SEC games and one Pac-12 game in Bill Snyder Family Stadium over that span. With the incredible annual gauntlet of the Big 12’s true round-robin format, our schedule needs to make sense for K-State and having marquee non-conference opponents in Manhattan is one way we honor our fans as well as accomplish our goal of providing Value to the University, Community and State.

From 2011-2015 the Cats averaged 7.2 home games, compared to an average of 6.28 among the other nine Big 12 schools. West Virginia has the next highest average number at 6.6 and three Big 12 teams averaged 6.0 home stadium games per season. With the 2017 non-conference slate also finalized and multiple non-conference home games already under contract or pending contract in years 2018-2021, K-State is on track to host seven home games annually each of those five years.

With 23 consecutive sellouts at Bill Snyder Family Stadium heading into this week’s matchup versus #19 Oklahoma, fans are encouraged to join the K-State football season ticket wait list and can do so by visiting www.k-statesports.com/tickets or calling 1-800-221-CATS.

Again, thank you for your patience as we work through the scheduling process, and we look forward to an exciting remainder of 2015 and certainly the seasons ahead.

Go Cats!”

John Currie

Upcoming K-State Football Non-Conference Opponents (all subject to change)

2016
Sept. 2           at Stanford
Sept. 10         BYE
Sept. 17         Florida Atlantic
Sept. 24         Missouri State

2017 (Five Home Big 12 games)
Central Arkansas
Charlotte
at Vanderbilt

2018 (Four Home Big 12 games)
Mississippi State
UTSA
Home TBA

2019 (Five home Big 12 games)
Bowling Green
at Mississippi State
Home TBA

2020
Vanderbilt
Buffalo

2021
Stanford

Lon Floyd, K-State Athletics’ retired assistant athletic director, has been selected to receive the 2015 Wildcat Pride Award, which recognizes Kansas State University faculty or staff who have been instrumental in advancing the mission of the K-State Alumni Association through the support of its programs.

The award honors a current or emeritus K-State faculty or staff member for his or her advocacy of alumni relations, with a special emphasis on support and participation in alumni programs that engage members of the Wildcat family.

Floyd earned his bachelor’s degree in 1967 and his master’s degree in 1971 from K-State. He began his career with K-State Athletics ad an assistant track coach from 1969 to 1972. Floyd returned to K-State in 1996 as assistant athletic director of the Ahearn Fund until his retirement in 2015.

During his time with the Ahearn Fund, Floyd started the nationally renowned Harley Day; created and organized Cat Town; grew the Powercat Auction into K-State’s single largest annual fundraising event; and managed the tradition-rich Steer-A-Year program. For the past 19 years Floyd has been recognized throughout Kansas for his work organizing the annual summer Catbacker Tour, which brings K-State leaders and students to clubs around the state and provides K-State alumni, fans and future students an opportunity to interact with fellow alumni, coaches and student-athletes.

The Royals are back in the ALCS for the second straight year following a 7-2 win over Houston in Game 5 of their division series. Alex Rios supplied a tiebreaking, two-run double in the fifth, Kendrys (KEHN’-drees) Morales added a three-run homer and Johnny Cueto (KWAY’-toh) was outstanding over his seven innings on the mound.

Kansas City trailed 2-1 in the fifth until Rios hit a two-run double off reliever Mike Fiers (FY’-urz). Rios came around to score on Ben Zobrist’s sacrifice fly. Morales capped the scoring with a blast off Dallas Keuchel (KY’-kul) in the eighth, allowing Royals fans to breathe easier.

Cueto (KWAY’-toh) held the Astros to two hits while striking out eight over the first seven innings. Cueto’s only mistake was a two-run homer to Luis Valbuena in the top of the second. He retired all 16 hitters he faced following the home run.

Astros starter and loser Collin McHugh left the game with two runners on and a 2-1 lead in the fifth. McHugh was charged with three runs on five hits in four-plus innings.

Game 1 of the ALCS is Friday in Kansas City.

Release from Kenny Lannou, Associate A.D. for Communications

MANHATTAN, Kan. – Kansas State will open the 2016 football season with a marquee nationally-televised matchup against Stanford the evening of Friday, September 2 in Palo Alto, Athletics Director John Currie has announced. The home-and-home agreement with the Pac -12 power finalizes the non-conference portion of K-State’s 2016 schedule.

Following the opener at Stanford, the Wildcats will host Florida Atlantic on September 17 and Missouri State on September 24 at Bill Snyder Family Stadium to close out the non-conference slate. Stanford will make a return trip to Manhattan on September 4, 2021. Time and television network designation for the Stanford game will be announced at a later date.

“We are excited to announce a home-and-home series with Stanford of the Pac-12 Conference,” Currie said. “With more than 7,500 friends and alumni in the state of California, and our game there next season taking place over Labor Day weekend, this series gives the K-State Nation a great opportunity to again showcase its national reputation as one of America’s top traveling fan bases.”

The Stanford agreement continues a solid trend of marquee matchups for the Wildcats as K-State has already played recent series with Auburn (2007, 2014), UCLA (2009, 2010) and Miami (Fla.) (2011, 2012), while future series with Mississippi State (2018, 2019) and Vanderbilt (2017, 2020) have previously been announced. The Wildcats and Cardinal have never met on the football field heading into next season’s opener.

The conference portion of the schedule will be released in the coming weeks. The 2016 season will be one in which K-State will host four league games at Bill Snyder Family Stadium, which coupled with the two home non-conference games will provide a rare occurrence of less than seven home games for the Wildcats. K-State is the only Big 12 Conference program to play seven or more games in its home stadium in each of the last five years, and following six home games in 2016, the Wildcats will expect to have at least seven home games annually from 2017-2021.

“We kept working every possible angle to find a seventh home game, but with just 11 months remaining before the 2016 season, the Stanford series became an attractive option that gives us an opportunity to further our program and University on a national level,” Currie added. “This accomplishes our goal of having at least 11 FBS opponents on the schedule each season and ensures that we will have a high-visibility peer conference opponent on our schedule for the next six years, including two SEC games and one Pac-12 game right here in Bill Snyder Family Stadium over that span. With the incredible annual gauntlet of the Big 12’s true round robin format, our schedule needs to make sense for K-State and having marquee non-conference opponents in Manhattan is one way we honor our fans as well as accomplish our goal of providing Value to the University, Community and State.”

From 2011-2015, the Cats averaged 7.2 home games, compared to an average of 6.28 among the other nine Big 12 schools.  West Virginia has the next highest average number at 6.6 and three Big 12 teams averaged 6.0 home stadium games per season. With the 2017 non-conference slate also finalized and multiple non-conference home games already under contract or pending contract for each of the years 2018-2021, K-State is on track to host seven home games annually each of those five years as well.

With 23-consecutive sellouts at Bill Snyder Family Stadium heading into this week’s matchup versus No. 19 Oklahoma, fans are encouraged to join the K-State football season ticket wait list and can do so by visiting www.k-statesports.com/tickets or calling 1-800-221-CATS.

Upcoming K-State Football Non-Conference Opponents (all subject to change)

2016
Sept. 2                  at Stanford
Sept. 10                BYE
Sept. 17                Florida Atlantic
Sept. 24                Missouri State

2017 (Five Home Big 12 games)
Central Arkansas
Charlotte
at Vanderbilt

2018 (Four Home Big 12 games)
Mississippi State
UTSA
Home TBA

2019 (Five home Big 12 games)
Bowling Green
at Mississippi State
Home TBA

2020
Vanderbilt
Buffalo

2021
Stanford

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) – Vikings star Adrian Peterson offered encouragement to Jamaal Charles on Wednesday, three days after his Chiefs counterpart sustained a torn ACL in his right knee against Chicago.

It was Charles who, after tearing his left ACL four years ago, reached out to Peterson later in the season. Minnesota’s running back had just torn the same ligament in his knee that December.

Both players returned from their injuries the following season.

Peterson said he can’t imagine having to go through the painful hours of rehabilitation for a second torn ACL, which Charles is facing. But he also said that his fellow Texan has the “God-given ability” to come back from such a devastating injury.

The Chiefs visit the Vikings on Sunday.

Kansas State knew that this part of their schedule would be tough facing four top 20 ranked teams in five games, and their 0-2 start to that five game stretch angers the Wildcats.

The Wildcats first loss was by two points to Oklahoma State and then they followed that by a last-minute touchdown loss to TCU last weekend.

K-State Quarterback, Joe Hubener explained that they were angry after the OSU loss and the loss Saturday to TCU just piled it on.

“We’re tired of losing these tough games. We know that we can play with anybody, we showed that. TCU is a great team and we played right with them the whole game,” said Hubener. “We fully expect OU to come in here prepared (Saturday), but we want this win.”

Oklahoma will also be coming into the game angry after a 24-17 loss to Texas last week that dropped them from ranked 10th in the nation to 19th.

It’s ok for the players to be angry according to Coach Bill Snyder but it’s what they do with that anger is what matters.

“At the end of the day it’s really about what do we do about that anger, and what do we do about that, hopefully, passion that is created through that anger to rectify whatever the issue may be,” said Snyder. “I know Oklahoma will be that way, and I’m certainly hoping that our people will.”

A Kansas State win Saturday will be the Wildcats first win over the Sooners in Manhattan since 1996, and its first win over a ranked opponent when it’s unranked since the 2011 Baylor game.

Saturday’s game will kick off at 2:30 pm from Bill Snyder Family Stadium. You can catch that game starting with pre-game at 12:30 pm on the “Talk of JC” 1420 AM.

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) – The Chiefs placed Jamaal Charles on injured reserve Tuesday after the star running back tore the ACL in his right knee while making a cut against the Chicago Bears.

Charles had an MRI on Monday that confirmed the extent of the injury.

The Chiefs filled his roster spot by promoting running back Spencer Ware from the practice squad. Ware is a former sixth-round pick out of LSU who spent the offseason with Kansas City.

The Chiefs also released linebacker Tyrell Adams, cornerback Jeremy Harris and offensive lineman Daniel Munyer from the practice squad Tuesday.

Running back Darrin Reaves, offensive lineman Michael Liedtke, cornerback Saalim Hakim and linebacker Jayson DiManche were signed to replace them.

—

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP) – The Kansas City Royals honored two firefighters who were killed while fighting a massive blaze that engulfed an apartment building.

Two other firefighters were injured when the building collapsed in Kansas City, Missouri, on Monday night, shortly after fire crews evacuated its residents and rescued two people from the second story. The two injured were hospitalized in stable condition.

Royals first baseman Eric Hosmer, whose father Mike is a retired Miami firefighter, wore a Kansas City Fire Department shirt during batting practice on Tuesday. So did third baseman Mike Moustakas, while pitcher Jeremy Guthrie wore a hat honoring the department.

The Royals forced Game 5 in their AL Division Series against the Houston Astros with a dramatic late-inning comeback. The decisive game is Wednesday night.