News and Notes: Kansas vs. Texas

News and notes while wondering... well, at this point, I think we're all just wondering.

• KU (5-5 overall, 1-5 Big 12) will try to snap a five-game losing streak Saturday in Austin against the #2 Texas Longhorns (10-0, 6-0). Kickoff is scheduled for 7 p.m. For reasons known but to God, the game will be televised on ABC.
• The 7 p.m. kickoff is the latest kickoff of the season for KU in 2009.
• Kansas has lost five straight for the first time since they lost seven in a row to finish the 2002 season.
• The Jayhawks are 6-6 on the road over the last four seasons but just 1-3 this year.
• KU is 10-27 on the road under coach Mark Mangino.
• Kansas is 0-1 against ranked teams this season, losing to then-#25 Oklahoma, 35-13, a few weeks ago. The Jayhawks are 5-13 against ranked teams under Mangino, but prior to his arrival, it had taken KU 60 tries against ranked teams to pick up the same number of wins.
• Embattled Jayhawk quarterback Todd Reesing will be returning to his hometown Saturday. He was Texas Class 4A Player of the Year as a junior and Central Texas Player of the Year as a senior.
• Despite recent struggles, Reesing is 25-11 as a starter, second most wins in a three-season period since the 2006-08 group won 26. He still ranks in the top 10 nationally for completions, passing yards and total offense.
• He guided Kansas to bowl games in consecutive seasons for the first time in school history.
• Reesing holds virtually every KU career passing record in the book as well as the top three season marks in most every passing category. He is one of just five players in Big 12 history to throw for over 10,000 yards.
• Among active players, Reesing ranks fourth in the NCAA in passing yards per game for his career, fourth in total offense per game, fifth in completions per game, sixth in touchdown passes and sixth in touchdowns responsible for.
• KU is 2-7 against Texas. The last time Kansas beat the Horns was 1908. Before that, 1901. They wouldn't meet again until the formation of the Big 12, and it's been ugly since. Texas has won the last to UT-KU meetings in Austin by a combined score of 125-14. Texas beat Kansas in Lawrence last season, 35-7.
• Thirty-five Jayhawks are from the state of Texas.
• In their 5-0 start, KU committed just five turnovers that resulted in just one score. During the five-game losing streak, Kansas has committed 13 turnovers resulting in nine TDs and a field goal.
• Opponents have taken possession of the football on the Jayhawks' side of the 50-yard-line 11 times in the last five games. Opposing defenses also scored directly off two KU turnovers: an interception returned for a TD (Oklahoma) and a fumble returned for a TD (Texas Tech).
• Kansas' 335 yards of total offense was the most against Nebraska all season, and the 17 points scored was the second-highest total surrendered by the Bugeaters in 2009.
• KU committed just one turnover against UNL after coughing it up 12 times in the previous four games.
• Kansas faced the conference's top defense in Nebraska last Saturday and will face the conference's top offense in Texas this Saturday. It just keeps gettin' better and better.
• The Jayhawks limited All-American DT Ndamukong Suh to a season-low three tackles. Jeff Spikes started at OT for Kansas.
• WRs Dezmon Briscoe and Kerry Meier combine for 198.94 yards per game receiving, tops in the nation for a receiver duo.
• The pair combine for 15.52 catches per game, second in the country behind two WRs from Bowling Green who go for 16.1 a pop.
• Meier ranks third in the NCAA in catches per game (8.3), and Briscoe is fifth in the country in receiving yards per game (110.44).
• The two have combined for 10 100-yard receiving games (five each) and five 10-catch games (Meier four, Briscoe one).
• Celebrity birthdays this Saturday: grouchy young man Ken Griffey, Jr. (40); NFL hall-o-famer and Harry Connick look-alike Troy Aikman (43); annoying singer Bjork (44); “24” president Cherry Jones (53); actress Goldie Hawn (64); Ghostbuster Harold Ramis (65); “That Girl” actress and Phil Donohue's wife Marlo Thomas (71); and, if they hadn't already assumed room temperature, baseball hall of famer Stan Musial (89) and jazz legend Coleman Hawkins (105).