MANHATTAN, Kan. — Talk about adding pressure to an already edgy situation.

Kansas State players and their coach are saying nothing this week to relieve tension as the Wildcats' winner-take-all Big 12 North showdown at Nebraska looms. It's almost as if K-State wants to deal head on with a giant burden in addition to its task against NU.

“Everybody feels we've had a fairly good season,” senior defensive tackle Jeffrey Fitzgerald said, “but without this game, it would all be for nothing. I feel like we've worked too hard in the offseason and throughout this season for it to be for nothing.”

The scenario is simple for Kansas State: Beat Nebraska and advance to the Dec. 5 Big 12 championship game, followed by a bowl game.

Lose and the season is over — a fifth year out of six without a bowl appearance after 11 straight bids.

“There's a lot riding on this game,” junior offensive guard Zach Kendall said. “But we've put it on ourselves, so we can't be too upset.”

K-State has six wins, but only one of its two September victories against Football Championship Subdivision competition counts toward bowl eligibility.

It could've clinched bowl eligibility last weekend but lost to Missouri, 38-12.

Still, the Wildcats (6-5, 4-3 Big 12) have undoubtedly overachieved in 2009. League wins over Iowa State, Texas A&M, Colorado and Kansas allowed K-State to return quickly to the spot it vacated as a North Division contender earlier this decade under coach Bill Snyder.

The 70-year-old Snyder, back in charge after he retired following the 2005 season, leads the reclamation project. Reminders of former coach Ron Prince, 17-20 in three seasons at Kansas State, are sparse around the stadium named for Snyder.

Snyder and the Wildcats on Tuesday held their weekly press conference in the Big Eight room, the seemingly retired quarters down a hallway and through the double doors from Prince's former spot.

On the walls hang placards with the names and logos of all the old Big Eight schools. No sign of Baylor, Texas A&M, Texas Tech or Texas.

The unbeaten Longhorns, with one more win or an Oklahoma State loss, await Nebraska or K-State in two weeks at Cowboys Stadium.

No, the Big Eight is not coming back, but Kansas State is banking it can return under Snyder.

He won three Big 12 North crowns, one fewer than Nebraska in 13 years of the league's existence. So perhaps it's fitting in this first year of Snyder's second tour in Manhattan that the two old powers meet under such circumstances this week.

Snyder, though, said he's thinking only about the here and now.

“I haven't thought back about any of (the old games), in all honesty,” he said. “It's a different team, a different time.”

That won't deter Wildcats from considering the history at stake.

“It's the perfect scenario, really,” said center Wade Weibert of the NU-Kansas State matchup.

Weibert, a junior from Hillsboro, Kan., said he remembers watching the first Kansas State win in 30 years over Nebraska from his grandparents' living room in 1998.

He said the Wildcats' attitude this year under Snyder is “worlds different” than in recent seasons.

“I don't know if I can point to any one thing,” he said. “I think it's kind of the collectivity of the different coaches we have.”

K-State started poorly this year but won three of four after a 42-point loss on Oct. 10 at Texas Tech.

“Finally, as a dog, you get tired of being kicked,” Weibert said. “We decided we were going to bite back.

“Some of the guys on the team, we got tired of losing. You've got to make that extra effort to win games. It's been extra effort, but it's also been a lot of coaching. They've taught us how to win. It's still a learning process. We're trying to learn how to win — how to have that champion's mentality.”

Saturday's stakes leave the Wildcats full of motivation to beat Nebraska.

“If we lose, me and a lot of other seniors are not going to play another football game for as long as we live,” senior quarterback Grant Gregory said. “That's pretty good motivation.”

Contact the writer:

402-444-1031, mitch.sherman@owh.com

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