Get a quick look at what Kansas State head coach Chris Klieman had to say in today's press conference, followed by our immediate thoughts, in Rapid Reaction.

A complete transcript of Klieman's full comments will be provided later today on K-StateOnline.

Paraphrased opening statement: Our guys are anxious to get back to work today. We have a big, important week ahead of us. We need to make a number of corrections and need to identify and hit on those things. I know we were disappointed on Saturday for not meeting the expectations we want to have. It's easy to praise when you are successful and be negative when you aren't successful, and I think sometimes we can be too negative. We are going to keep moving forward.

Question: On young players this week in practice...

Klieman: We are going to put those guys in lot of situations to see how close they are, because we are going to need them moving forward.

Reaction: A lot of players are getting closer to having to redshirt or not, soon (check out Derek Young's Redshirt Tracker), and we'll start seeing some of those answers as soon as next week at TCU.

Question: What stat or metric do you pay perhaps the most attention to?

Klieman: For us it's probably turnover margin, and explosive plays. Explosive plays meaning 20 yards or more. And, it's on both sides of the ball. There are some plays we can live with giving up due to what we're deciding to do scheme wise, but there are others we can't give up with what we are doing. We need to create more explosive plays and limit them.

Reaction: It's been said a lot, by Klieman and by us, how hard it is for any offense - and maybe this K-State one, especially - to be perfect on so many plays in a long drive. K-State will still work to create more ways to be explosive itself, and figuring out ways to eliminate those on defense.

Question: Follow-up on young players/freshmen in general...

Klieman: Cooper Beebe (as an example) is one of the most impressive players I've seen. Cooper Beebe will be a great player at Kansas State, but he's still a true freshman with plenty to learn.

Reaction: The question was not specifically about Beebe, but his answer, and choice to talk about him in that manner, is sure fun to hear.

Question: On Jordon Brown...

Klieman: I would still say he's a few weeks away. I would be knocking on wood for Oklahoma, but I know he's not going to be with us this week and I doubt for next week.

Reaction: Seems like a very accurate, honest assessment from the head coach.

Question: Would you consider personnel changes during the bye week?

Klieman: I would say you always have to be doing that. It doesn't mean there are going to be changes, but you have to always be evaluating that all the time, and that's certainly something we are going to do this week.

Reaction: A lot of talk about K-State vs. K-State this week, which is good to hear, and I wouldn't be stunned to see a couple of changes on either side of the ball if the staff believes it to be best.

Question: You mentioned earlier you were overthinking some things as coaches in those Big 12 games (Klieman did say, earlier, they overthought things specifically during the lightning delay at Oklahoma State when asked this same type of question). Do you feel like it was at all, maybe, trying to learn how to coach in the Big 12, or is it just that was that game?

Klieman: That has nothing to do with it... No, not at all. That's... Once again, it doesn't matter what level you are at. You (directed at the reporter) always want to emphasize that, and you can believe what you want, but that's not what's happening. You can believe what you want to believe, and I'll believe what I want to believe.

Reaction: Amazingly, the reporter asked a follow up question asking if Big 12 football is different after hearing this initial response. Chris Klieman has gone out of his way to make clear his stance is "football is football." At some point, a reporter has to understand there's no reason in continuing to set up Klieman for this type of answer. He was agitated with it, today, and rightfully so. You can ask a question about learning or what needs to improve, but if you tee up Klieman by implying they have to figure out how to coach at this level, this is what he's going to say.

Question: On Devin Actil...

Klieman: He has a great leg. He gets the ball off on time. His ability to punt the ball a direction, into the wind or with the wind, I think he has the ability to punt on Sundays.

Reaction: NFL scouts love Anctil, no doubt. He will have that chance.

Question: Did you have better quality depth at North Dakota State than you do right now at K-State?

Klieman: Oh, well, yeah, but we were there eight years. We were able to get a ton of kids partial scholarships, or to walk on, because they didn't have any other opportunities around there in that state. There are tons of those opportunities around here with other schools, junior colleges, etc. It's different. We had a lot of time to build that there and a lot of different situations different there than here.

Reaction: Did a nice job of answering this honestly while avoiding, the best he could, the trap of saying "we had more depth at North Dakota State than at K-State," and implying that was a problem he shouldn't have walked into here. He handled it very well.

Question: On third downs...

Klieman: We have to keep working on them and emphasizing those situations. We are going to put them against our No. 1 defense this week and ask them to show us different things and see how we handle it. I've been pleased with our scout team, but it's different. You dont't have an A.J. Parker on the scout team, for example. And we may do more of that moving forward, to, going good vs. good a little bit more to increase that competition.

Reaction: Interesting to see some specifics of what they are going to do to attack the third-down issues in practice as opposed to just saying it needs to go better.

Question: On Marcus Hayes (who we reported was off the team two weeks ago)...

Klieman: He decided to go in a different direction. It's his right. I didn't agree with him, because I really enjoy him. But I love him, and I have nothing bad to say against Marcus Hayes at all, he's a wonderful kid.

Reaction: Well said.

***Subscribe to K-StateOnline by clicking here***

Talk K-State football and basketball in the largest, most active K-State message board community anywhere, The Foundation.