‘What a kick’: Chris Tennant lifts K-State past Kansas with clutch 51-yard field goal

It is impossible to overstate how much confidence Kansas State football coach Chris Klieman has in his kicker.

Some K-State fans may have been nervous when Chris Tennant jogged onto the field to attempt a 51-yard field goal with 1 minute, 42 seconds remaining in the fourth quarter of an intense Sunflower Showdown rivalry game against the Kansas Jayhawks on Saturday at Bill Snyder Family Stadium.

Not Klieman. In his mind, three points had already been added to the scoreboard.

“I knew that was going in,” Klieman said. “I had no doubt in my mind. There was nobody on our sideline that had any doubt, because for one month that kid has just done nothing at practice but drill the football. It was exciting for him to be able to do that, being a senior from Kansas.”

Tennant, a 6-foot-5 senior from Shawnee, lifted the Wildcats to a thrilling 29-27 victory over the Jayhawks by making arguably the biggest play of the night.

It was without a doubt the biggest play of his football career.

“What a kick,” K-State defensive end Brendan Mott said. “That’s all I have to say. Our whole team, our whole staff, we have so much confidence in him. He’s really grown as a kicker. We all have his back. Heck of a kick by him. That was big time.”

Tennant took an interesting path to this point.

As a freshman, it looked like he might be a dominant kicking force for the Wildcats. Back then, he connected on five field goals, including one from 51 yards away. But he was unable to remain the starting kicker as a sophomore when he began missing and lost his job to Ty Zentner.

He worked his way back up the depth chart as a junior, making 11 of 14 field goal attempts. But he didn’t connect on any memorable kicks.

For that reason, Tennant describes his time at K-State as “up and down.”

But there was nothing down about the way he played on Saturday. He was the biggest man on campus.

“K-State fans have given me hell, and it’s fair there,” Tennant said. “I always haven’t been that guy. So I’m glad to finally reach the point in my career where I’m confident and I make others around me confident.”

Tennant said he could have connected on his game-winning field goal from as far away as 58 yards. His clutch kick sailed through the uprights on Saturday. It was on such a line that fans began cheering well before the officials signaled it good.

“After I hit the kick,” Tennant said, “and right when I made contact, I knew it was good.”

Tennant had a special celebration planned for the moment.

He told holder Simon McClannan several times to pretend to pitch him a baseball after he made the field goal, allowing him to hit a home run by swinging an invisible baseball bat.

The Wildcats celebrated so hard after the kick was good that Tennant had to remind McClannan of his pitching duties at midfield. But Tennant savored his home run swing when he made it.

Not only did he make a game-winning kick, he lived a dream that he has been chasing since the day he arrived in Manhattan.

Perhaps that is why he was easily able to explain his success this season, even after the biggest and most emotional kick of his life.

“Just maturity,” Tennant said. “As you get older, things become easier. You’ve been to the hotel more times, you’ve done warmups more times, you’ve done practice more times. You just understand the system. And with that, I feel like I have stepped up as a leader as well. That helps. That carries over to the field.”