What would have happened if Bear Bryant had remained at UK as its football coach?
Editor’s Note: As Lexington celebrates the 250th anniversary of its founding, the Herald-Leader and kentucky.com each day throughout 2025 will share interesting facts about our hometown. Compiled by Liz Carey, all are notable moments in the city’s history - some funny, some sad, others heartbreaking or celebratory, and some just downright strange.
Jan. 14, 1946: Paul “Bear” Bryant is hired as the head football coach for the University of Kentucky.
Considered by many to be one of the sport’s greatest football coaches ever, Bryant was at the University of Kentucky for eight seasons. before heading to Tuscaloosa and the University of Alabama.
Here in Lexington, Bryant took over a losing football program. In 1944, the team had a 3-6 record, and in 1945, it fell to 2-8. During a three-year period in the 1940s, the program won only one game against an SEC team.
Prior to being hired to coach at UK, Bryant had been the head coach at the University of Maryland. At 32, he was one of the youngest head coaches at a major university in the country.
He was born in Moro Bottom, Arkansas, the 11th of 12 children, and would grow to be a 6-foot, 4-inch football player for Fordyce High School.
Legend says he got his nickname “Bear” after agreeing to wrestle a captive bear at a carnival when he was just 13.
After graduating from the University of Alabama, Bryant held a number of coaching positions.
In 1942, after the December 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor, Bryant left his position as Vanderbilt’s head coach, where he had led the Commodores to a victory over the University of Kentucky, to join the U.S. Navy. He served on a transport ship, the USS Uruguay.
After an honorable discharge, he was offered the head coach position at the University of Maryland where he led the team to a 6-2-1 record. After conflicts with the school’s president, Harry Byrd, Bryant left to coach UK.
In their first season under Bryant, the Wildcats compiled a 7-3 record with two wins against SEC opponents. Between 1947 and 1953, Bryant would lead the Wildcats to their first bowl appearance and the school’s first SEC title.
Bryant eventually took the team to the Great Lakes Bowl, the Orange Bowl and the Cotton Bowl Classic.
Bryant resigned after the 1953 season, saying he felt the school’s basketball program, led then by the legendary Adolph Rupp, would always be UK’s primary and most notable sport.
Seventy-two years later, some things never change.
This story was originally published January 15, 2025 at 3:07 PM.
