Mark Stoops hired Liam Coen to help UK break through and defeat teams like No. 1 Georgia
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Preview: No. 20 Kentucky at No. 1 Georgia
Click below to read more of the Herald-Leader’s and Kentucky.com’s preview coverage ahead of Saturday’s Kentucky-Georgia football game at 7 p.m. in Athens, Ga.
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For all the good work Mark Stoops has done with the Kentucky football program, there is a level of the SEC hierarchy the Wildcats have yet to breach.
Under Stoops, UK is 0-13 against current Southeastern Conference football kingpins Georgia (0-10) and Alabama (0-3).
When the No. 20 Wildcats (5-0, 2-0 SEC) face Kirby Smart’s No. 1 Bulldogs (5-0, 2-0 SEC) on Saturday night in Athens, the SEC East Division lead will be on the line for the third time in the past six meetings between the Wildcats and Bulldogs.
The showdown with the Dawgs will also provide another chance to see if the biggest move Stoops has made to help Kentucky crack the top of the SEC will pay off.
When Stoops initially hired Liam Coen to run the UK offense before the 2021 season, the thought was that the former Los Angeles Rams assistant could help the Wildcats add a dynamic passing option on top of the rugged running game that had fueled Kentucky’s rise.
The hiring of Coen was a tacit acknowledgment from Stoops that the staples that had driven UK football’s ascension — stout defense and a physical rushing attack — were not going to be enough to take down the SEC elite.
In 2018, when Kentucky and Georgia met at Kroger Field in the game that determined the SEC East champion, the Bulldogs held UK star running back Benny Snell to 73 yards on 20 carries and limited UK to 84 total rushing yards in a 34-17 Dawgs victory.
Two seasons ago, in Coen’s first crack at Georgia, the Wildcats and Bulldogs met in Athens with both teams unbeaten to battle for the SEC East lead. The Dawgs held UK star running back Christopher Rodriguez to 7 rushing yards in 7 attempts and limited Kentucky to 51 total yards on the ground in a 30-13 Bulldogs win.
Statistically, Georgia’s defense against the run so far in 2023 has not been as overwhelming as we’ve come to expect. Through five games, the Bulldogs are only 37th in the FBS against the rush, allowing 113.4 yards a contest.
Yet after Kentucky star running back Ray Davis hung a cool 280 rushing yards on then-No. 22 Florida in UK’s 33-14 demolition of the Gators last Saturday, Smart and the Georgia defensive brain trust will presumably prioritize making the Wildcats (try to) beat them with something other than Davis and the ground game.
With Coen back for a second season calling the Kentucky offense after a one-year return to the L.A. Rams in 2022, we are about to find out if UK now has a passing attack capable of stressing the defense of an elite SEC team.
In a very real sense, Kentucky quarterback Devin Leary, the former North Carolina State star, and sophomore wideouts Barion Brown and Dane Key were recruited to give UK the capacity to make plays through the air against teams the caliber of Georgia.
Until Florida, Coen and UK had been trying to feature the passing attack this season.
Even after Davis helped Kentucky run for 323 yards against the Gators, the Wildcats are only 92nd in the FBS in rushing, averaging 131.5 yards a game.
Even after UK threw for only 69 yards in throttling Florida, the Cats are 46th in the FBS in passing, averaging 265 yards a game.
Yet, too often so far in the 2023 season, it has felt like the Kentucky passing attack has been working against itself.
Leary, so far, has not been as accurate (57.7 completion percentage) nor as consistent as expected.
Though UK’s issue of dropping catchable balls extends beyond the two of them, Brown (19 catches, 251 receiving yards, one touchdown) and Key (13, 196, two) have so far let too many balls they’ve gotten their hands on hit the ground.
“I think, again, we had three or four drops,” Coen said Saturday after the dismantling of Florida. “At the end of the day, it’s hard when you only have so many opportunities … and we don’t take advantage of those (opportunities).”
One can’t help but wonder how much the “dropsies” have impacted the confidence and comfort level of Leary as he learns a different offensive system while playing for a new team.
“I don’t think he loses confidence in (the receivers), honestly,” Coen said. “I think they have, really, such a good rapport, friendship, a belief in each other (that there is no loss of belief).
“I think (the drops are) just something we’ve got to get fixed. … To move the chains and be effective on third down, we’ve got to catch the football better.”
A season ago, Brown had a monster game with 10 catches for 145 yards and a touchdown in UK’s 16-6 loss to Georgia. With two catches for 23 yards, Key was effective against the Bulldogs, too.
To snap Georgia’s 22-game win streak and score a program-defining victory, Kentucky needs Coen and his offense to give the Wildcats a more diverse attack than the Cats have taken into their other recent, high-profile showdowns with the Dawgs.
This story was originally published October 2, 2023 at 10:47 AM.
