Why Kansas Jayhawks teammates say receiver Quentin Skinner has ‘big-catch radar’

Freshman Kansas Jayhawks quarterback Isaiah Marshall threw the football to some reliable receivers last season at Southfield (Michigan) A&T High School, evidenced by his 3,114 passing yards and 39 touchdowns in 2023.

There was nobody on his state-title receiving corps, however, who presented as tall a target as KU senior Quentin Skinner, a 6-foot-5, 195-pound wideout from Claremore, Oklahoma.

“I had somebody 6-2 who plays like him, but not 6-4, 6-5,” the 6-0, 215-pound Marshall said in a recent interview with The Star. “You look downfield and see he can get by anybody. If he has a deep post, he’s going to get open. He’s tall, with a long stride, very fast.

“He has ‘big-catch radar.’ You can throw it anywhere and he’s going to go get it.”

KU also has a redshirt freshman quarterback in Cole Ballard and redshirt junior in star Jalon Daniels. They are equally enthused about having such a tall receiving threat in Skinner, who caught 29 passes for 587 yards (a team-leading 20.2-yard average) and two touchdowns last season for the 9-4 Jayhawks.

“He is a great receiver. He’s 6-5 and can run,” said Daniels, whom coach Lance Leipold has said will start the Jayhawks’ season opener against Lindenwood (7 p.m. Thursday, Children’s Mercy Park in Kansas City, Kansas).

“I mean if you are 6-5, can run, can make catches,” Daniels said. ”… I’ve seen him be able to run by people and seen him make people miss. I am ready to be able to go out there this season and be able to show the world what Quentin Skinner can do.”

Ballard chimed in with his own praise of Skinner, saying: “He’s electric. (A defender) has got to know where he’s at. He can run by you at any moment.”

Asked if Skinner was underrated, Ballard said: “100%. He does not get the respect he deserves.”

Actually KU’s three-headed monster at receiver has yet to receive any league-wide accolades.

No one among the senior trio of Skinner, Lawrence Arnold and Luke Grimm was all-league last season. They were not named preseason all-league this season, either.

Arnold caught 44 passes for 782 yards and six TDs last year; Grimm hauled in 33 passes for 555 yards and six TDs.

“We’ve been identified, maybe labeled, as a certain type of guys,” Skinner said in a recent interview with The Star. “Our group … we’ve never been highly recommended or lower recommended.”

“We kind of always push ourselves to what we want to be for the team. The sky is the limit (for the receiving corps). The opportunity is there. We want to take it full throttle and head-on.”

Skinner said the KU receivers are not playing up any no-respect angles for the upcoming season. In fact, he said he hasn’t paid attention to the prognosticators’ picks. He said he hadn’t heard that ESPN’s Rece Davis has picked KU to win the Big 12 title.

“It’s always great to hear, but also you don’t want to hear it,” Skinner said. “It may lower your standards or make them even higher, too. The culture of the team … I feel we are always walking around like we’ve got something to prove in a way.

“You can label us No. 1 in the world. I bet in some way, shape or form, we’d say we’re even better than No. 1.”

Asked if he had any predictions for the season, Skinner said: “My first prediction would be a sellout crowd for game one. Hopefully I’ll say that. That’s my one prediction, sellout crowd.”

The game is listed as a sellout at the stadium that seats 18,500 for soccer.

Skinner said it’s comforting to play next to fellow seniors Arnold and Grimm. The three are also quite close with fourth-year junior Daniels and fourth-year senior running back Devin Neal.

“Chemistry is something we’ve always had since we were young. We’ve always been told by older guys, ‘You are special,’’’ Skinner said of the receivers group. “We always put our heads down to work.

“To have us all back is really fun,” Skinner added. “I remember the first day of move-in, when we were here as freshmen. We all moved our stuff in, did our team check-in for that day. And it was around 7 o’clock and we were all out there running routes. It’s like a movement.”

Skinner said the older Jayhawks are trying to serve as leaders for the younger players.

“We’re saying, ‘Be a good person.’ At the end of the day, I feel like being a great man will lead you in a great direction,” Skinner said. “Having the want-to, to learn … it may be cheesy, but it’s going out of your way to coaches, to players, to come to they meeting rooms and say, ‘Hey bro can I sit down with you? Let me learn some things from you.’ So just to get better experience in different ways of life and just how to be better as a man.”

Freshman quarterback Marshall appreciates every drill in which he participates with the older receivers, a group that includes seniors Trevor Wilson and Torry Locklin and tight end Jared Casey.

“I feel our top-five receivers make a lot of great plays,” Marshall said. “I can throw it anywhere and they are going to go get it. To see that, I’m like, ‘Wow, they are ready for the NFL.’

“They 100% help me. Say if somebody is coming free, I can throw it up to Arnold. He’s going to go make the play for me. To see how hard they work, it helps us all.”