Cold snap coming - what does this mean?

I've noticed several people expressing their concerns over fear that we may have a LONG winter because of this cold snap arriving later in the week. Just remember, there's no correlation between an early cold snap and what the rest of the winter will be like. October is a month to study the weather patterns to try and unlock some clues for the approaching winter season, but there's still plenty of uncertainty yet.

Early snowfall record for northwest Kansas:

Snow is expected for far northwest Kansas by Thursday night. We can all agree it's VERY early, but not likely to set a record unless there's some significant amount of snow (which seems unlikely given warm ground temperatures)

Look how widespread the snow will be across the northern Plains from Wednesday night - Thursday night. This will be the first big winter storm to track and it will dump huge amounts of snow in Wyoming and the Dakotas. Winter storm watches are already posted. 

Frost/Freeze potential:

Friday AND Saturday mornings should be noted as temperatures will be dropping. It will still be rather breezy early Friday morning, which should help keep the atmosphere stirred up. However, this is truly some cold air and with several hours of 20s on the way across the west, this will likely end the growing season. Central and eastern Kansas will likely be up against frost (with mid 30s both mornings)

We will return to fall weather for mid-late October: