These three trends should worry Kentucky football coach Mark Stoops
For well-seasoned UK football fans, Kentucky’s crushing 38-35 come-from-ahead loss to Clemson in the TaxSlayer Gator Bowl two Fridays ago pulled the scab off emotional wounds left by a past litany of such agonizing Wildcats defeats.
The good news from the UK perspective is the only audience that really matters — prospective football recruits — doesn’t have the same lengthy frame of reference into Kentucky’s star-crossed pigskin past.
What recruits are likely to remember from last week’s contest is that UK went toe-to-toe with one of the past decade’s most successful college football programs and produced a game with such drama that one analyst rated the Gator Bowl the second-most entertaining contest of the entire 2023 bowl season.
Still, the fact remains that Kentucky football (7-6, 3-5 SEC for the second straight season) has now failed to meet the Big Blue Nation’s expectations in back-to-back years.
For Cats coach Mark Stoops, three trends from the past two seasons should be worrisome.
1.) UK has not been winning “the close ones.” In 2018, when Kentucky went 10-3, had a 5-3 SEC mark and beat No. 12 Penn State in the Citrus Bowl, the Wildcats went 3-1 in one-possession games (contests determined by eight points or less).
In 2021, when Kentucky went 10-3, had a 5-3 SEC mark and beat No. 15 Iowa in the Citrus Bowl, the Cats went 5-1 in one-possession games.
Conversely, over the past two seasons, the Wildcats have combined to go 3-5 in one-score contests — and were 1-3 in such games this season.
For Kentucky to have any chance at high-level success in the Southeastern Conference, the Cats have to get back to winning — probably more than their fair share of — the close ones.
2.) Sloppy play has plagued the Cats for two seasons. The biggest reason UK has struggled to win tight games in both 2022 and 2023 is the Wildcats’ recurring penchant for self-sabotage.
Two seasons ago, Kentucky lost what likely would have been the game-winning touchdown pass in what became a 22-19 loss at Mississippi due to a penalty. What assuredly would have been a game-clinching UK interception in what became a 24-21 loss to Vanderbilt was nullified by a penalty.
Kentucky very nearly gave up a late 21-17 lead at Missouri by snapping the ball over its punter’s head in the final minutes. Only a Herculean effort by then-UK punter Colin Goodfellow to race down the errant snap and get a punt off saved UK from disaster.
This past year featured too much of the same dynamic.
Kentucky turned the ball over three times and committed seven penalties, many in crucial times, in a 17-14 road loss at South Carolina. The Clemson fourth quarter, with UK giving up a double-digit lead by turning the ball over four times, should go into the self-sabotage hall of fame.
Under Stoops, Kentucky’s best teams have been tough-minded and able to close out games.
In the era of the one free transfer and NIL, it might be tougher for a coach to create the level of accountability necessary to produce those traits. Nevertheless, to get UK football back on the ascension, Stoops has to get that equation solved.
3. In SEC games, UK is not protecting its home field. During the 10-win seasons of 2018 and 2021, Kentucky went 3-1 at Kroger Field against Southeastern Conference foes.
In the 7-6 campaigns of the past two years, UK has gone 1-3 in home games versus league teams.
Moving forward, with the SEC moving away from divisions in 2024 and Oklahoma and Texas joining the league, the importance of Kentucky winning its home conference contests is only going to increase.
In the 2024 SEC schedule revamp, Kentucky gave up a home game with Mississippi State and road games at Missouri and Arkansas. The Wildcats will add a home game with Auburn and road games at Ole Miss and Texas.
Of the 15 teams that will be in the SEC with UK next season, the Wildcats have all-time winning records against four opponents. The 2024 Southeastern Conference schedule cost the Wildcats games with three of those four foes — Mississippi State (26-25), Arkansas (5-3) and Missouri (9-5).
Instead, the Cats will face two teams, Auburn (6-27-1) and Ole Miss (14-29-1), against whom they have emphatically losing records plus a third team, Texas, that played in this season’s College Football Playoff.
Any realistic aspiration of Kentucky getting above seven wins in 2024 likely means UK must go at least 3-1 in SEC home games. That requires winning at least three against South Carolina, Georgia, Vanderbilt and Auburn.
Even if UK takes care of business against the Gamecocks and Commodores — each of whom beat Kentucky on their most recent trips to Lexington — to get to the third league victory at Kroger Field, the Wildcats must either vanquish Georgia, which has not lost at UK since 2006, or Auburn, which has not lost at UK since 1966.
Given the overriding strength of Kirby Smart’s Bulldogs program, the need to beat Auburn in Lexington might be the single, biggest key to Kentucky’s 2024 season.
The new SEC
Kentucky football’s all-time records against the 15 teams that will be in the Southeastern Conference with the Wildcats for the 2024-25 school year:
▪ Alabama—1-39-2.
▪ Arkansas—5-3.
▪ Auburn—6-27-1.
▪ Florida—21-53.
▪ Georgia—12-63-2.
▪ LSU—17-40-1.
▪ Mississippi—14-29-1.
▪ Mississippi State—26-25.
▪ Missouri—9-5.
▪ Oklahoma—1-2.
▪ South Carolina—14-20-1.
▪ Tennessee—26-84-9.
▪ Texas—0-1.
▪ Texas A&M—1-2.
▪ Vanderbilt—49-43-4.
