‘They beat us in every area.’ Everything Mark Stoops said after Kentucky’s loss at Georgia.

Everything University of Kentucky head football coach Mark Stoops said during his press conference following Saturday’s 51-13 loss to Southeastern Conference rival Georgia in Athens:

Opening statement: “They beat us in every area. It’s hard to come up with an opening statement after a beatdown like that. It’s been awhile. It doesn’t feel good. I told the team, the good news is it counts as one game. We have to respond and bounce back. I’ll put this one on me. We weren’t prepared in any area. We didn’t play very good in any area. They beat us from the start to the finish. So, pretty complete game by them. We weren’t up for the challenge. Didn’t coach very good and didn’t play very good.”

On if the secondary was not ready for Georgia’s early passing attack: “I think we had a pretty good understanding that they were going to attack us down the field. We know that. They’re putting things together. Playing at home, I think I mentioned it in my press conference or one of the sessions we anticipated that. They’re a little different at home than on the road. I think they come out and hit us with some shots in some areas that we got exposed.”

On if his unhappiness about Tuesday’s practice made this performance particularly concerning: “Yeah, it was concerning to me at the time. I didn’t feel good about it. I do think we responded and had a better week, but we can’t waste any days, any opportunities. Can’t do it.”

On early penalties: “Lack of discipline. I just didn’t have them ready for that moment. The moment was too big for them. We didn’t play very good, we didn’t play very disciplined, we didn’t play very tough. We didn’t get it done. It’s not coach speak, but we as a staff and I have to do a better job of getting them ready and getting them prepared. That’s a very good football team. I know some guys on their staff. They’re putting it together and they played a complete game tonight.”

On if Devin Leary is healthy, considering the missed throws to open receivers: “I mean, yeah, I believe he is OK. I would have no reason to believe he’s not. Yeah, I was a little disappointed myself. Usually I don’t say a whole lot during games to a quarterback, to not get him off (his game), but there’s no excuse to not hit some of those. We had some guys wide open. You put that, whether we missed some open plays to keep it close early and then you add in the penalties, it gets away from you very quickly. When you’re not playing good and then you do some stupid things as well, you put that in their plays, the No. 1 team in the country and it gets away from you fast. And it did.”

On if he has any updates on injured players: “We had some guys who were hurting going into the game, some guys that were hurt throughout the game. We’re going into game seven next week, so it gets tough.”

On going 2-2 after blowout loss to Tennessee last year and how they avoid letting this loss spiral: “We have to respond this week. I just addressed that with the team. I addressed it with them early in the season. I actually talked about it in our first meeting of the year, that I didn’t think I did a very good job of having the team handle adversity (last year). I knew it’s going to come. That doesn’t mean I believed we were going to lose a game, but even within the game you’re going to go through some adversity at times. Interceptions, momentum swings, you’re going to hit it, and you have to respond the right way. I will not tolerate us not responding. We’re going to respond. I have great respect for Missouri. We always have good games. We have to get back – this one, it counts as one loss. That’s the only good thing about this beatdown is it counts as one, but we have to respond and get back to work and get back to being us.”

On if he regrets not taking the ball first after winning coin toss: “I mean, if I could know it was going to start like that, yeah I would. At least maybe I could run some clock off there, get a first down or two, get some field position. We just didn’t start very good. They started very quickly. They kicked out butt from the beginning to the end. In hindsight, I guess it really don’t matter.”

On what he means by Georgia starting to put some things together: “Again, I’m just speaking for us. But coaching football for a long time, a team is not going to play their best for 12 games, or 13 if they’re in the championship game. They’re not going to play their best each and every week. Sometimes you put it together and sometimes you don’t. They played very good tonight. That’s the only thing I can speak of, what I’ve seen on tape and how they played tonight. They kicked out butt.”

On how important it is to get players to understand how important it is not to let one loss turn into two: “They understand. They know already. I’ve already talked to them about it. We can’t let it happen, period.”

On tackling issues: “I saw a lot of missed tackles. I saw them making us miss, and then I saw also us uncharacteristically undisciplined with dirty eyes. I also complement them with the way they were creating some plays that we all look at and say, ‘How in the world does a guy like that get so open?’ Well, some of it they’re creating, they did a nice job and they got us bad vision. Even on some of the big ones you see 19 running down the field wide open and you’re like, ‘How in the world you going to leave that guy open?’ Well, they dressed it up…”

On what program needs to do to get over the hump in these games with SEC East control on the line: “I mean, we got to just keep on grinding. I mean, I’m not going to give you a headline. We’re going to keep on working. It’s a game. It’s one game that we weren’t prepared for and they beat our butt. You ask me one more time and I’m going to say ass.”

On if they had to abandon run game after early success because of the score: “It’s really disappointing because we couldn’t stop them. We didn’t stop them, and then when we did we got a silly penalty. Then we’re moving the ball and we get penalties that stop ourselves. The game – again, don’t make me say it again. They beat us from top to bottom the entire game, but however, yeah, that’s very unfortunate and that’s not very good or smart by us to get penalties and stop ourselves when we’re driving the ball and are able to keep things on schedule. But penalties killed two drives and then a missed throw killed another drive. You can’t just come down here and do that. Especially, we have to play as a complete team. When defensively we’re having our problems stopping them, clearly – and give them credit for that — at least you could stay on schedule if we don’t do silly things that we don’t normally do. It was very undisciplined, it wasn’t very smart and it’s not very good. And I’m not very proud of it.”

This story was originally published October 8, 2023 at 9:16 AM.