From Lawrence to London: Inside the Kansas Jayhawks’ journey to its first international game

On July 21, a cargo ship departed the United States, bound for London. After a five-week journey across the Atlantic Ocean, it landed in England. Inside were essential elements to bring major American college football to the capital of the United Kingdom for the first time in 38 years.

Bottled water. Athletic tape. Training tables. All part of what would become 36,590 total pounds of cargo sent by the University of Kansas via boat and plane in preparation for the Jayhawks’ game on September 19 against Arizona State at Wembley Stadium in the inaugural Union Jack Classic.

Four days before kickoff, the KU traveling party of 283 people — 90 football players, 130 coach and staff, 56 band members and cheerleaders and seven members of Kansas Athletics administration — embarked on a 4,400-mile flight from Topeka to London Stansted Airport, about 30 miles northeast of Central London, to take part in the school’s first international game, catching up to its boatload of supplies that had arrived in that city on August 28.

“That included a lot of things that we were able to get by without for a little while,” says Andy Eisch, assistant athletic director for communications at Kansas. “We were not trying to get that out last minute.”

The shipment also included some oversized cargo, including band instruments and KU’s own medical tents.

“It’s a huge undertaking, and a lot of people have made this happen,” Kansas head coach Lance Leipold said in a press conference before the trip. “Our rosters are a lot bigger than the NFL rosters, so there’s just more things that are happening — more people to be fed, more people just to transport, equipment, taping, all the things that need to take place.”

American college football games have been played outside the United States for decades. There was a game in Tokyo each season from 1977 through 1993, eventually known as the Coca-Cola Classic. Four games have taken place in Australia, most recently in 2017. And Ireland has hosted 12 college games since 1988, with the Aer Lingus College Football Classic in Dublin’s Aviva Stadium becoming a staple of Week Zero.

The NFL has hosted games at Wembley since 2007 and continues to grow its global footprint, with nine regular–season games on the international schedule this season.

But this Saturday will be the first time college American football has made its way to England since Richmond defeated Boston University in the first and only Imperial Bowl at London’s Crystal Palace National Sports Centre in 1988.

With a year to prepare, hundreds of people to transport and more than 9,000 items required to take the field, Kansas’s football staff had a long list to check off before their first trip abroad.

Passports and Preparations

The Union Jack Classic became official in September 2025 with the announcement that Big 12 schools Kansas and Arizona State would meet at Wembley this year. Playing games abroad is one of the initiatives conference commissioner Brett Yormark has targeted as a way to raise his league’s profile, and the Jayhawks and Sun Devils volunteered for the assignment.

Arizona State played in the 1990 Coca-Cola Classic in Japan, but Kansas has never played a game outside of the United States. Leipold, however, has coached twice in international games. He was a graduate assistant at Wisconsin in 1993 when the Badgers defeated Michigan State in the final Coca–Cola Classic, and 26 years later he was head coach of Buffalo when the Bulls beat Charlotte in the Bahamas Bowl.

To get an early read on what to expect when playing overseas, the Jayhawks reached out to teams familiar with the process, including the NFL’s the Jacksonville Jaguars (whose 14 international games are the most in that league, 12 of which have come at Wembley Stadium) and fellow Big 12 Conference members Iowa State and Kansas State, which faced off in Dublin in 2025. Kansas’s chief of staff and director of football operations Michael Painter took two advance trips to London in the year leading up to the game.

Back in the States, the first order of business was making sure KU’s roster would be eligible to go abroad. More than half of Kansas’s 90 players set to travel to England didn’t have a passport. Those 49 players started on paperwork back in January, and the team designated a photographer for passport photos.

Eisch estimated the team will take up about 370 hotel rooms across three hotels in London. They chartered a Boeing 777 for the trip, a much larger plane than they would use for a game in the U.S.

When it comes to nutrition, the players will drink a different whey protein shake, since American imports of animal products are not allowed into non–European Union countries.

“The intricacies of international travel, customs and everything you can and can’t bring into a country, I think it’s really unique,” Eisch said. “It may be something people wouldn’t normally think of.”

One aspect the staff certainly considered was the time difference. London operates six hours ahead of Lawrence, Kansas, and adjusting to the time zone is essential for game preparation.

The Jayhawks departed from Topeka, Kansas, around 7 p.m. on Tuesday after a day of practice. The team flew for just over seven hours before landing at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday in England. Players were encouraged to sleep on the plane and power through the first day to adjust to the new time zone.

A New Experience

For many of Kansas’s players and staff, the London game will be first time they’ve traveled outside of the U.S. But that won’t be the case for at least three players with family ties to the United Kingdom.

Kicker Martin Connington will experience a homecoming of sorts, as his father grew up in England and his extended family on that side still lives there.

“He’s been over to the U.K. a lot,” Eisch said. “He has some family up there, so he goes quite a bit, and I know he’s really excited to go.”

Backup punter Ben Shipley’s parents are also from England. And starting punter Matt Gill is from Sydney, Australia, but he also has family in England.

The team designated Thursday for tourism activities. They plan on taking a guided tour down the River Thames, exploring the Tower Bridge and the Tower of London before gearing up for Saturday’s kickoff, which takes place at 5 p.m. local time.

Kansas fans making the trip to London can attend the Adidas fan event at the Adidas Flagship Store the day before the game. The Union Jack Classic is holding a pep rally with both teams’ spirit squads on Friday evening. Several Jayhawk fan hubs have been arranged at pubs across the city in the lead–up to the game.

Fox Sports’ Big Noon Kickoff pregame show will also broadcast live from outside Wembley on Saturday, with the game itself airing on FS1 and streaming on Fubo.

While there are no official plans yet to bring back the Union Jack Classic beyond this season, it is expected to be a multi-year event.

Given the scarcity of college football games overseas, this may prove a one-time opportunity for Kansas. Which is why Leipold hopes his players make the most of their British adventure.

“Hopefully, as they see a different country and experience different things, they take that in and have a lot of pride about it,” Leipold said. “When they take the field, there will be greater opportunities to know that they’re doing something special and something that I think is on the cusp of happening more often.”