The UK offense has lost its identity. Can the Cats get it back in time to end strong?
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Game day: Mississippi State 31, No. 12 Kentucky 17
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader’s and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Saturday night’s Kentucky-Mississippi State football game at Davis Wade Stadium in Starkville, Miss.
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Among his many other football-related skills, it turns out Wan’Dale Robinson is a pretty fair game analyst.
Asked after No. 12 Kentucky’s dispiriting 31-17 loss at Mississippi State Saturday night what the Wildcats needed to do to rev up their stagnant offense, Robinson cut right to the crux of the matter.
“Really, we just have to get our run game going,” the Western Hills High School product said via a video news conference. “That’s something, we have to start up front. Then it comes out to us at the receiver spot and being able to make plays on the outside.”
If UK (6-2, 4-2 SEC) is going to pull out of its two-game losing streak; win the season’s four remaining contests; and produce the first double-digit win regular season by a Wildcats football team since 1977, the Cats have to reboot their signature rushing attack.
The most shocking thing about Kentucky’s defeat in front of an announced crowd of 49,487, cowbell-clanging fans at Davis Wade Stadium was not that Bulldogs quarterback Will Rogers completed a stunning 36 of 39 passes for 344 yards.
No, it was that an MSU offense designed to disdain the run by Air Raid devotee Mike Leach outrushed — 94 yards to 66 yards — a UK attack in which everything is predicated off of the Wildcats being able to move the football on the ground.
Over its past two games, Kentucky has failed to crack 70 yards net rushing in either contest.
Two weeks ago, going up against No. 1 Georgia in Athens, UK was held to a net-51 yards rushing.
Bad things are going to happen for Kentucky if it can’t establish its identity in games as a physical, running offense.
On Saturday night, those undesirable occurrences took the form of three interceptions thrown by UK quarterback Will Levis.
The Penn State transfer entered the Mississippi State game off the two best performances of his Kentucky career. Levis completed 14 of 17 passes with three touchdowns in the Cats’ win over LSU and went 32-for-42 with two TD tosses in the loss at No. 1 Georgia two weeks ago.
But forced to play for a second straight game without a reliable rushing attack, Levis (17 of 28 passing for 150 yards with one touchdown to go with the three picks) reverted to some of his early-season performance problems.
Errant Levis throws to open receivers likely cost Kentucky two touchdowns. Of the UK QB’s three interceptions, two came with Kentucky driving, while the third set up a Mississippi State TD.
After Josh Ali’s 74-yard, punt-return touchdown and a 41-yard Matt Ruffolo field goal had given Kentucky a 10-0 lead, “then the wheels (came) off with turnovers and not moving the ball,” UK Coach Mark Stoops said.
UK did not make Levis available to speak to the media after the game.
Asked what approach he took as a teammate toward a quarterback who had struggled so in a game, wideout Robinson (nine catches, 79 yards) said “I am going to give (Levis) his time to go ahead and regroup and do his thing. … Then, once Monday comes, just letting him know we all have his back.”
The attack that new Kentucky offensive coordinator Liam Coen brought from the Los Angeles Rams is based on running plays and pass plays looking the same to defenses at the point where reads are made. That involves a heavy dose of play-action passing.
That isn’t going to be effective, though, absent a potent running attack.
In fairness, in the two games Kentucky has now spent without the ability to move the ball on the ground, the Wildcats have been up against two of the most formidable run defenses in FBS football.
Entering Saturday’s games, Georgia was second in the nation against the rush, giving up only 63.4 yards a game; Mississippi State (5-3, 3-2 SEC) was ninth, surrendering 92.7 yards per contest.
Still, I entered this season thinking a Kentucky offense with a veteran offensive line whose reputation for physicality is such it has earned the nickname “The Big Blue Wall,” plus what was perceived as a stable of capable running backs, meant UK would be able to run the ball at least some against anybody.
The past two games have proven that not to be true.
At least Kentucky’s last four opponents are not statistically as stout against the run as the prior two. Going into this weekend, Tennessee was 54th in the FBS in rush defense (allowing 144.4 yards a game), Louisville 64th (146.9), Vanderbilt 96th (172.1) and New Mexico State 104th (187).
“At the end of the day, the world is not falling,” UK’s Robinson said. “(The season) is not over or anything like that. We still have a chance to do some things that haven’t been done around here in a long, long time.”
If UK is going to close out its season the way the Big Blue Nation has been envisioning, it has to reclaim its offensive identity as a physical running team.
This story was originally published October 31, 2021 at 1:58 AM.
