The hopes and fears for UK football fans about Kentucky’s game vs. high-flying Vandy
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Preview: Kentucky vs. Vanderbilt
Click below to read more of the Herald-Leader’s and Kentucky.com’s preview coverage ahead of Saturday’s Kentucky-Vanderbilt football game at Kroger Field.
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What Kentucky football backers should hope for and what they need to fear as the Wildcats (3-2, 1-2 SEC) prepare to play SEC rival Vanderbilt (3-2, 1-1 SEC).
Kickoff is at 7:45 (EDT) Saturday, Oct. 12, at Kroger Field (capacity 61,000) on the campus of the University of Kentucky in Lexington.
The game will be telecast by the SEC Network.
Hopes
▪ The combination of Vanderbilt’s shocking 40-35 upset last week of then-No. 1 Alabama and the fact that coach Clark Lea’s Commodores also upset UK, 24-21, on their previous trip to Kroger Field in 2022 gives the Wildcats ample motivational impetus to play well.
▪ The Vanderbilt offense that hung 417 yards of total offense on Alabama while converting 12 of 18 third down attempts and possessing the football a whopping 42:08 has yet to face a defense as good as Kentucky’s.
The Wildcats are fifth in the FBS in total defense (allowing an average of 244.2 yards a game).
UK veteran linebackers D’Eryk Jackson and Jamon Dumas-Johnson should have the experience to help the Wildcats defense figure out the misdirection and “eye candy” that are a big part of the Commodores attack.
▪ Kentucky enters the game off an open date. In the Mark Stoops coaching era, that scenario has not always yielded advantageous results for UK.
Under Stoops, UK is 5-9 in games that immediately followed a regular season open date — and the Wildcats have lost their last three such contests.
However, the Cats are 3-0 vs. Vanderbilt in games that immediately followed a Kentucky open date during Stoops’ coaching tenure.
Fears
▪ Rather than emotionally flat and physically beaten up in the week after playing Alabama, Vanderbilt comes to Lexington — a place where the Commodores have a history of playing Kentucky tough — feeling confident and inspired to continue to soar.
▪ In New Mexico State transfer Diego Pavia, Vanderbilt has found a quarterback who, simply put, “has the magic.”
Over Pavia’s last three starts vs. SEC teams — a 31-10 win at Auburn last season as New Mexico State QB; and this season for Vandy at Missouri (a 30-27 double-overtime loss) and Alabama (see above) — he has completed 69 percent of his passes and thrown for seven touchdowns with no interceptions.
▪ For what, on paper, looks likely to be a low-possession game between two ball-control offenses, Vanderbilt has been much more efficient at scoring touchdowns in the red zone than Kentucky has been.
On 23 trips inside their opponents’ 20-yard line, the Commodores have scored touchdowns 73.9 percent of the time — 17 of 23.
Conversely, UK’s 16 trips into the red zone have yielded touchdowns only 56.3 percent of the time — 9 of 16.
In a contest that seems likely to be decided by offensive efficiency, those are worrisome numbers from the Big Blue’s perspective.
This story was originally published October 11, 2024 at 7:30 AM.
