First Scouting Report: Can Kentucky ground Mike Leach’s high-flying Air Raid?
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Game day: South Carolina 24, No. 13 Kentucky 14
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader’s and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Saturday night’s Kentucky-South Carolina football game at Kroger Field in Lexington.
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An early look ahead to the Kentucky Wildcats’ next football game:
The opponent
No. 13 Kentucky (4-2, 1-2 SEC) will play No. 23 Mississippi State (5-1, 2-1 SEC) on Saturday (Oct. 15) at Kroger Field (seating capacity 61,000) in Lexington.
The game will kick off at 7:30 p.m. and be broadcast by the SEC Network.
Coach Mike Leach’s Bulldogs rocked Arkansas 40-17 Saturday in Starkville.
Series history
Mississippi State leads 25-24 in a series in which the home team has won the last seven games.
UK Coach Mark Stoops is 3-6 vs. Mississippi State.
MSU head man Mike Leach is 1-1 vs. Kentucky.
Most recent meeting
Mississippi State quarterback Will Rogers completed 36 of 39 passes for 344 yards with one touchdown pass and no interceptions to lead the Bulldogs to a 31-17 win over Kentucky on Oct. 30, 2021, at Davis Wade Stadium in Starkville.
Know your foe
1. In the coaching game of chess, this is something of the rubber match between Mike Leach’s Air Raid offensive attack and Brad White’s UK defense.
In 2020, the first time former Hal Mumme-era Kentucky offensive coordinator Leach coached against his former school, White’s defense throttled the pass-happy MSU attack.
The Wildcats intercepted a whopping six passes and held MSU without a touchdown in a 24-2 victory at Kroger Field.
Last season in Starkville, Leach and State got revenge. The Bulldogs threw the ball 39 times and had only three incompletions and held the ball a whopping 41:10 compared to Kentucky’s 18:50.
This year’s matchup should be compelling. Going into the games of Oct. 8, Mississippi State was seventh in the FBS in passing at 346.6 yards a game; Kentucky was 16th in the FBS in pass defense, surrendering only 173.6 yards a game.
2. For all the attention that the Mississippi State offense gets, it is MSU defensive coordinator Zach Arnett’s unorthodox 3-3-5 base defense that has given UK fits in each of the past two seasons.
In 2020, Arnett’s defense held Kentucky to 157 total yards even as the Cats won 24-2.
Last season, UK gained only 216 yards vs. MSU and turned the ball over four times in Starkville.
This year, we will see if new Kentucky offensive coordinator Rich Scangarello has better success solving Arnett’s “D” than prior UK OCs Eddie Gran (2020) and Liam Coen (20121) have had.
3. As Kentucky saw last season in Starkville, Mississippi State quarterback Will Rogers operates the Air Raid with the precision of a surgeon’s scalpel.
Entering Saturday’s game with Arkansas, the 6-foot-2, 210-pound junior from Brandon, Miss., had completed 73.1 percent of his throws (171-of-234) and had thrown for 19 touchdowns vs. only three interceptions.
Against the Razorbacks, Rogers completed 31 of 48 passes for 395 yards and three touchdowns with no interceptions.
This story was originally published October 8, 2022 at 11:05 PM.
