Why even a strong showing against Georgia might not solve one of Kentucky’s biggest issues

The question was obvious given the circumstances.

In the immediate aftermath of Kentucky’s shocking loss to Vanderbilt, a once promising season felt lost. But there were two games still left on the schedule. Next up was a daunting matchup with No. 1 Georgia.

Where would Kentucky go from here? How would the Wildcats bounce back from the embarrassment of Vanderbilt snapping its 26-game SEC losing streak on their home field? What was left to play for?

“Hopefully we come out with our piss hot next week and have some motivation against a good team,” quarterback Will Levis said after the game. “It’s a shame we can’t do that when we’re playing a team like Vanderbilt.

“Yeah, we’re going to be up, we’re going to be ready to play (against Georgia). I’m not going to be worried about that. The fact that we can’t get ready to play for some lower games is frustrating.”

In one answer Levis managed to sum up one of the most alarming parts about Kentucky’s 2022 season and show why even a strong performance against Georgia might not be enough to soothe that concern.

After years of building Kentucky into a consistent winner with a physical mindset and mental toughness built on proving doubters wrong, Mark Stoops was faced with a different challenge this year. For the first time in his tenure, outside doubts were largely absent this summer.

Reporters picked Kentucky to finish second in the SEC East in July, ahead of Tennessee, which turned out to be a playoff contender. For just the fifth time in program history, Kentucky was ranked in the preseason Associated Press top 25.

No longer could Kentucky play the disrespect card. Instead, players and coaches had to learn to deal with the kind of praise famously described by legendary Alabama coach Nick Saban as “rat poison.”

“It’s human nature, and we fight against it as strong as we can,” Stoops said when asked about that challenge this week. “I had a conversation with one of our leaders and one of our great players yesterday. We talked about that exact thing.”

The reasons to be excited about Kentucky in the summer were legitimate.

Quarterback Will Levis, widely projected as a first-round pick in the 2023 NFL Draft, was back, as was most of the defense that ranked 25th nationally in yards allowed per game last season. The status of star running back Chris Rodriguez, the SEC’s leading returning rusher, was up in the air, but it seemed likely he would return to the field at some point in the first half of the season after serving a suspension. Kentucky had welcomed its highest-ranked signing class of the recruiting website era to campus.

Perhaps overlooked in that hype was massive turnover on the offensive line where three starters, including two NFL Draft picks, were gone. Yes, the 2021 signees were talented, but they were also young and would inevitably suffer some of the miscues that come with inexperience while playing in college football’s best conference.

“I think there’s some really young players and players that maybe haven’t gone through the trials that maybe some of the older guys have and (bring) the appreciation that we have for all of the hard work that we did to put our program in this position,” Stoops said. “That’s my job as a coach and our job as an organization to teach and try to preach and do that. As I tell the team a lot, you learn from scars, you learn from the beats, you learn from mistakes.”

Kentucky’s newcomers have scars now.

There was the loss at Ole Miss, which featured two fourth-quarter red zone fumbles with a chance to take a lead. South Carolina provided their first lesson in how a letdown in energy could turn into a disappointing performance. The blowout at Tennessee was humbling. The Vanderbilt loss was embarrassing.

Those performances mean Kentucky is unlikely to have to worry about another summer of hype taking away the team’s edge next season. The Wildcats will almost certainly slide back into the bottom half of the SEC East in most preseason predictions.

Kentucky will be able to use its perennial underdog status as motivation once again.

But if Stoops’ program is ever to take the next step into the top tier of the league, it will need to eventually learn how to build on success.

Stoops has no plans to change his approach to dealing with preseason expectations. He will not denigrate his team publicly simply for the sake of building a false narrative. If he thinks his team is good, he plans to reflect that confidence during the summer talking season.

Maybe the scars gained this season will help current players better handle praise in the future.

Bringing maximum energy to a game against the No. 1 team in the country will not prove that lesson is learned though. Playing well in a rivalry matchup with Louisville in the regular season finale or a hyped bowl game will not either.

“The old guys (have) been through it,” Stoops said. “They understand, they’re committed. We just all need to do a better job and I need to do a better job of … getting that consistency of us playing with that intensity and practicing all the time.”

NEXT GAME

No. 1 Georgia at Kentucky

When: 3:30 p.m. Saturday

TV: CBS-27

Radio: WLAP-AM 630, WBUL-FM 98.1

Records: Georgia 10-0 (7-0 SEC), Kentucky 6-4 (3-4)

Series: Georgia leads 61-12-2

Last meeting: Georgia won 30-13 on Oct. 16, 2021, in Athens, Ga.

This story was originally published November 17, 2022 at 7:56 AM.

Jon Hale

Lexington Herald-Leader

(859) 414-6776

Jon Hale is the University of Kentucky football beat writer for the Lexington Herald-Leader. He joined the Herald-Leader in 2022 but has covered UK athletics for more than 10 years. Hale was named the 2021 Kentucky Sportswriter of the Year. Support my work with a digital subscription