Why Chris Klieman described Kansas State’s football game at Tulane as a ‘culture win’

It was hard to top the vibes around Kansas State’s locker room after the Wildcats rallied to defeat Tulane 34-27 on Saturday at Yulman Stadium.

Fans were screaming, parents were dancing and players were posing for pictures to commemorate their first road victory of this young season.

Junior defensive back VJ Payne clinched the game with a late interception and was still clutching the ball he caught in his right hand as he talked during postgame interviews. Nevermind that it featured a Green Wave logo and technically belonged to the home team.

But the mood was much different if you visited this place a few hours earlier.

When Chris Klieman addressed the K-State roster at halftime there was only one emotion: anger. Lots of it.

Tulane surprisingly led 20-10 at halftime, and K-State wasn’t playing all that well. The Green Wave were throwing for big yardage and the Wildcats weren’t executing on offense. They were in danger of suffering a loss, and no one was happy about it. That led to a fiery few moments.

Turns out, that was exactly what this K-State football team needed.

“I challenged the guys at halftime,” head coach Chris Klieman said. “I wasn’t upset or anything. I just said, ‘We can play better. We can play better on both sides.’ Then Marques Siegel, Avery Johnson, Hadley Panzer, Austin Moore and some of the older guys and captains stepped up. It was player led.

“I told the guys at the end of the game that was a culture win. We had discipline, toughness, commitment (and were) selfless. That’s what that was today. We beat a good Tulane team on the road and we’re so happy to escape with a win.”

Sigle, a senior safety, was in command of the room.

Teammates said he challenged his fellow defensive backs to stop letting Tulane quarterback Darian Mensah, who threw for 342 yards and two touchdowns, complete easy passes against them. He pushed the defensive line to get more pressure. He demanded more of the K-State linebackers. And then he turned to Johnson and said he expected more from K-State’s quarterback and the offense as a whole.

Then the older captains who remembered losing to Tulane at home two years ago jumped in.

“A lot of it was just us saying, ‘Do your job and do it fast,’” K-State linebacker Austin Moore said. “We had miscommunications at certain levels. Myself and other guys were trying to do too much and not doing our job. Everybody was messing up. So main thing was do your own job. We needed revenge on these guys. We weren’t going to let it happen to us again.”

K-State responded with much better play in the second half.

The Wildcats were still far from perfect, and the Green Wave had a chance to win the game late, but K-State fought back to tie the score in the fourth quarter and then take the lead on a scoop-and-score touchdown return of 60 yards from Jack Fabris.

“We had a lot of guys step up and be vocal in the locker room and just challenged the rest of our team,” Johnson said. “Guys stepped up and made big plays and we ultimately got the win today.”

The comeback began in the halftime locker room.

“The biggest thing we said was, ‘We’re not out of the fight,’” Johnson said. “It’s always going to be tough to win games on the road. We wanted to come out here and we wanted to start fast. We didn’t. How are you going to respond when adversity strikes? I took out the offensive line and challenged those guys. I told them to win your one-on-ones up front and we’re going to be just fine. That’s exactly what they did.”

K-State has much to work on moving forward. The Wildcats were mediocre, at best, during their opening victory over Tennessee-Martin. Then they needed defensive heroics to survive against Tulane as road favorites.

They will need to play better if they want to continue winning when Big 12 games arrive.

But the Wildcats proved they were mentally strong and united as a team against Tulane. In that regard, they are ahead of schedule.