UK football’s 2024 hopes are all but dead, but bye could be crucial for program’s future
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Game day: No. 7 Tennessee 28, Kentucky 18
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Saturday’s Kentucky-Tennessee football game in Knoxville.
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A short-handed Kentucky football team showed impressive resolve to push No. 7 Tennessee to the edge in a 28-18 loss in Knoxville, but the result still all but ended the Wildcats’ hopes of reaching a bowl game.
The upcoming bye week at least gives the Wildcats a chance to get a few of the more-than-a-dozen key players who were unavailable by the end of the Tennessee game healthy, but the biggest impact of the week off might not be felt until the offseason.
Despite a third straight season that failed to meet preseason expectations, Mark Stoops is in no danger of being fired due to his status as Kentucky’s career wins leader and his $44 million buyout. So, assuming he decides to return to UK next season, the conversations he has with players in the coming days could show just how large his offseason to-do list will be.
“It’s important,” Stoops said of the upcoming bye. “… I mean, our mindset will be to finish strong, but as coaches, as a head coach of course, you’ve got to look at big picture and your roster and what’s going on. There’s a lot of things to keep up with right now.”
A November bye week in advance of a game against an FCS opponent for a team that looks almost certain to miss a bowl game is essentially an invitation for all but the most hard core of football fans to shift focus to Mark Pope’s first basketball season, which starts Monday.
But what happens in the next week could be essential in paving the way forward for the program.
Kentucky is guaranteed to lose at least nine starters (center Eli Cox, left tackle Marques Cox, right tackle Gerald Mincey, running back Demie Sumo-Karngbaye, defensive lineman Tre’vonn Rybka, linebacker Jamon Dumas-Johnson, outside linebacker J.J. Weaver, safety Zion Childress and kicker Alex Raynor) as they have no eligibility remaining after this season. Defensive lineman Deone Walker might not have had the breakout season fans hoped for, but he is still widely projected as a first-day NFL draft pick and seems like a lock to turn pro.
But most of the rest of the starting lineup will have decisions to make about the draft, transfer portal or using their pandemic waivers to return for one more year.
Among them is running back Chip Trayanum, the much-hyped transfer from Ohio State who has appeared in just one game this season due to injury. After missing the Tennessee game, Trayanum will be eligible for a redshirt this season because he can appear in no more than four games, and Stoops confirmed last week a return was on the table for Trayanum.
“I’ll discuss a lot of things with a lot of people next week,” Stoops said Thursday.
Based on how those conversations go, Kentucky’s outlook for 2025 could vary widely.
If borderline draft prospects like Maxwell Hairston, Barion Brown and Dane Key elected to return to Kentucky, there would be reason to get excited about the Wildcats’ nucleus, but Hairston was ranked as a top-50 draft prospect entering the season, Key has enjoyed a breakout year and the assumption around the program has long been Brown would enter the draft when first eligible regardless of his projections.
Other even less obvious draft prospects could still start their professional career. Wide receiver Ja’Mori Maclin, who totaled 1,000 receiving yards at North Texas last season but has rarely been involved in the game plan for Kentucky this year, confirmed after making two acrobatic catches in the end zone against Tennessee (one for a touchdown and one for a two-point conversion) that he has not made his decision about using his final season of college eligibility in 2025 yet.
If the borderline draft prospects leave, a full rebuild could be needed before even considering the quarterback situation.
Brock Vandagriff retained his starting job in Knoxville after being benched in the second half against Auburn and stayed on the field until he suffered a head injury in the third quarter. Backup Gavin Wimsatt did lead UK on one touchdown drive but was unable to do anything with the ball and a chance to tie the game or take the lead in the fourth quarter and threw a key interception after making the wrong read on a third down when the game was still in doubt.
The bye week could provide an opportunity for an extended look at freshman quarterback Cutter Boley, who can play in the final three games without burning his redshirt season. The FCS game against Murray State after the bye appears to present a soft landing spot for Boley to play more, especially if Vandagriff’s injury keeps him out of action longer.
“We’ll see where we’re at with everything,” offensive coordinator Bush Hamdan said when asked if he expected to prepare Boley to play during the bye. “Obviously all these things will be discussed, but I think where we’re at right now, there’s probably a lot of that happening.”
Of course, the player decisions could hinge on what direction Stoops sees for his program.
He has frequently pointed to the heavy turnover at offensive coordinator — Hamdan is the fifth different play-caller in the last five years for UK — as a key reason for the offense’s struggles this season, but can Stoops afford to stick with an offense that has yet to score 20 points in an SEC game? That decision could impact the stay-or-go decisions of several offensive players.
“I think it’s really taking a good, solid look at, like, who we are and what we can do,” Stoops said last week when asked about how he could help Hamdan. “With his first year, obviously a very challenging, very tough time. And early on, I think he made that adjustment and said, ‘OK, this is who we can be to put ourselves in a position to be successful.’ I think there’s always a balance there and a fine line, because we obviously want to progress for the future too. And the program wants to always go forward, but the No. 1 objective right now is to go try to get a victory by any means necessary.
“I think he does a really good job that way. We know we have some shortcomings and some areas of concern and some areas that we have to get addressed. And those are program things that I got to get fixed. But he’s done a nice job of trying to adapt the best he can to what we can do.”
Kentucky has not been mathematically eliminated from bowl contention, but the Wildcats must now win out against Murray State, No. 6 Texas and Louisville to play in a bowl for the ninth consecutive season.
Missing a bowl would mean Stoops and his staff lose the December practices that can be helpful for player development. It would likely make the fundraising needed for name, image and likeness efforts harder.
And more changes are coming to college football with the NCAA expected to add 20 scholarships to football rosters next season and allow schools to begin sharing athletic department revenue directly with players. For a coach that has been public about how taxing the non-coaching aspects of the job in the current college football environment have been, Stoops will need to decide how best he can approach these new challenges.
That process has surely already started, but it will ramp up during what looks like a crucial bye week for the future of the program.
“We just got to keep on doing what we did with the preparation (before Tennessee), with getting their bodies healed up, getting their minds healed up, and trying to use our time wisely,” Stoops said. “Look at options to play better, but I love their resolve. I love the way they prepared and they fought.
“The outcome again wasn’t what we’re looking for, but if they’ll continue to prepare that way and fight, that’s all we could do.”
This story was originally published November 3, 2024 at 7:00 AM.
