Barring misfortune, Kentucky’s football team should, at worst, go 5-5 in 2020
The University of Kentucky learned its two additional 2020 opponents during an impromptu TV special Friday evening.
Here’s a brief look at those new foes, their history with the Wildcats and an assessment of how things could go in 2020.
New additions
Alabama: This was objectively, the toughest team that UK could have drawn, and not just because the Crimson Tide are ranked No. 3 in the preseason coaches poll. Historically, no SEC team has proved to be more difficult for the Cats to slay than ‘Bama, against whom it has a 2-37-1 all-time record. Its last win happened in 1997; that was the first one since 1922. UK is on a six-game slide against the Crimson Tide, who’ve won six of the last 12 national championships.
Mississippi: The Rebels have won 64.2 percent of their meetings against Kentucky — UK’s standing in the all-time series is 14-41-1 — and the Wildcats have won just twice in seven meetings beginning in the year 2000. Lane Kiffin, who for one season was the head coach at Tennessee and coached Alabama’s offense from 2014-2016, is in his first year as the Rebels’ skipper after a three-year stop leading the charge at Florida Atlantic. Ole Miss last season finished 4-8, its fourth straight year with a non-winning record (it finished 6-6 in 2017).
Breaking it all down
▪ Georgia and Florida were the toughest outs on the schedule before it was altered due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Assuming the remainder of Kentucky’s slate stays as originally scheduled, Georgia is coming to Lexington and Florida is a road trip. Who’s traveling where could be moot; if fans aren’t allowed in stadiums, home-field advantage won’t particularly matter outside of travel concerns. Kentucky under Stoops has bridged the gap against Florida, competitively, but only has one win to show for its efforts; that’s still one more win than his Wildcats have against Georgia, which the team hasn’t bested since 2009. Between these two and Alabama, UK has quite a gauntlet ahead of it — all three were ranked in the coaches’ preseason top 10.
▪ Auburn, another top-15 team against whom the Cats already had a game scheduled, is interesting. A couple of players have opted out of the season, and UK has played the Tigers competitively in its recent history. The nearest sample size is small — the programs have met only three times over the past 10 years — and the Tigers have been dominant overall (26-6-1), but this is the game on which a winning record could hinge in 2020.
▪ Nothing’s a given in the SEC, but Missouri and Vanderbilt could be penciled in as UK victories; they should finish at the bottom of the “weaker” division. The Cats boast more experienced talent than both Mississippi State and South Carolina but faltered to each last year; one could chalk that up to the injury circumstances at quarterback and put those in the win column, too. I will, especially since State is implementing a new offense (under former UK offensive coordinator Mike Leach) and Carolina has at least two experienced offensive linemen opting out of the season.
▪ Tennessee is a wild card. Kentucky since 1984 has beaten the Volunteers just twice, and neither of those victories occurred over the last two seasons, when UK arguably was a more talented bunch.
Some other thoughts:
▪ UK probably would have rather seen LSU than Alabama, but at least it didn’t get both. The defending national champions lost a record-setting 14 players to the NFL Draft in April, but return enough experience to earn a preseason No. 5 ranking from the coaches. Since winning back-to-back games in 1998 and 1999, UK is 1-6 in its last seven contests against the Tigers. That lone win was one of the most memorable in the Cats’ history, a 43-37 triple-overtime performance at what was then known as Commonwealth Stadium in 2007. LSU, ranked No. 1 before that loss, went on to win the national title that season.
▪ If you were hoping for an easy “draw,” Arkansas was the No. 1 pick. Of the five possible teams that could have been added to the schedule, it was the only one against whom UK has an all-time winning record (5-3). All of those meetings have occurred since the Razorbacks joined the SEC in 1992. The Wildcats have claimed three of the last four meetings, including a 24-20 win last season at Kroger Field (that game, you might recall, was Lynn Bowden’s debut at quarterback). It’s been a competitive series beyond the records; other than a 49-7 walloping that went Arkansas’ way in 2012, the other seven games were decided by an average of eight points.
Predictions
Taking everything into consideration, I think a 5-5 record is well within reach for the Wildcats. On paper that doesn’t sound all that exciting, but when you remember that UK has had a .500 or better record only 22 times in league play since the SEC formed in 1933, it sounds a lot more enticing.
The easiest path: Defeat the three East Division teams picked below you — Missouri, South Carolina and Vanderbilt — and sweep the Mississippi schools.
That seems incredibly doable, based on talent, but of course injuries and timing (as well as, possibly, the virus) will have their say. Wins against Auburn and Tennessee, from a talent perspective, seem attainable enough to think a 6-4 record is within earshot.
Then, if you beat any of the big three — Alabama, Florida, Georgia — it’s cake.
2020 Kentucky opponents
Home games — Georgia, Mississippi, Mississippi State, South Carolina, Vanderbilt.
Road games — Alabama, Auburn, Florida, Missouri, Tennessee.
Note: The SEC is expected to announce full schedules with dates next week.
