Let’s set aside Mark Stoops’ future to salute a UK football team that hasn’t quit
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Kentucky ended a 10-game SEC skid, beating Auburn 10-3 in hostile Jordan-Hare.
- Defense produced seven sacks, 12 tackles for loss and pinned Auburn inside its 20.
- Win highlights team resilience under Stoops and refocuses attention from buyout talk.
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Gameday: Kentucky 10, Auburn 3
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Saturday’s Kentucky-Auburn football game in Auburn, Ala.
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When Kentucky looked in danger of another collapse, a freshman made the key play
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Let’s set aside Mark Stoops’ future to salute a UK football team that hasn’t quit
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To this point, the only topic I could write about during Kentucky football’s slog through the 2025 season had been Mark Stoops’ hold on his job — and how much it will cost UK to buy him out.
Well, for one time, let’s set aside Stoops’ future as top Cat. Instead, let’s tip the collective hats to a Kentucky football team that has been awash in adversity yet has not quit.
In a vintage Stoops-era grinder Saturday night, Kentucky ended a 10-game Southeastern Conference losing streak by beating home-standing Auburn 10-3 before a stunned Jordan-Hare Stadium crowd of 88,043.
“Our players deserve it,” an emotional Stoops said afterward. “Our players never flinch. They never submit to any outside noise or pressure, they just stay the course.”
UK heroes were plentiful, starting with a defense that tackled Auburn ballhandlers behind the line of scrimmage 12 times and punter Aidan Laros — who pinned the Tigers inside their 20-yard line on all six of his kicks.
Add in one Cutter Boley-directed touchdown drive and an extreme effort play by freshman wideout Cam Miller to force a fumble that got the ball back for the Wildcats (3-5, 1-5 SEC) after Auburn (4-5, 1-5 SEC) had intercepted a Boley pass in the fourth quarter, and it was enough to get Kentucky its first SEC victory since upsetting then-No. 6 Ole Miss 20-17 on Sept. 28, 2024.
Said Stoops: “I’’m authentic when I tell you how much I love this team. I like coaching them, and I love the way they fight. And, you know, I’m very happy for them. They deserve this feeling.”
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As we work through the heroes from what was Kentucky’s third victory in its past 17 SEC games, let’s start with the defense.
Auburn entered the game having allowed more sacks, 30, than any team in the FBS. Recognizing a weakness, UK defensive coordinator Brad White dialed up a pressure-heavy plan of attack.
By the time the game ended, the Wildcats had sacked Auburn quarterbacks Ashton Daniels and Jackson Arnold a combined seven times. The Wildcats were credited with seven additional QB hurries and finished the game with 12 tackles for loss. Leading UK’s sack attack were senior tackle Kahlil Saunders and senior linebacker Alex Afari, each with 1.5.
“The guys executed really well today,” White said. “They rushed hard.”
Laros kept a shockingly-limited Auburn offense pinned inside the shadows of its own goalposts. Mostly due to Kentucky punting, Auburn began nine of its 10 offensive drives inside its own 25 — six of them inside the 15.
“The punts were key,” Stoops understated afterward.
Boley, Kentucky’s rapidly-developing redshirt freshman quarterback, was not as sharp at Auburn as he had been in his three prior games against Georgia, Texas and Tennessee. On Saturday night, he finished 18 of 29 passing for 161 yards with a touchdown throw and two interceptions.
But after he had thrown a late first-half interception that set up Auburn’s field goal, the Lexington Christian Academy product came immediately out of the locker room after halftime and directed Kentucky on a 75-yard drive that yielded the game’s only touchdown.
On the drive, Boley hit Fred Farrier for 13 yards on a third-and-11 and then hit Farrier, the former Franklin County star, for 32 yards on another third-and-11. Kendrick Law took an outside screen 13 yards for what would be the game’s only touchdown.
“One thing about Cutter is, he just plays,” UK offensive coordinator Bush Hamdan said. “Never too high, never too low.”
All of Kentucky’s good play might have gone for naught after Auburn’s AnQuon Fegans made a late fourth-quarter interception of a Boley pass and returned it to midfield.
However, UK freshman wide receiver Cam Miller knocked the ball out of Fegans’ hands, and Kentucky tight end Henry Boyer recovered at the Auburn 49.
“Seeing the ball carrier with the ball kind of loose, and I just knew that if I was to get a hand on it (with) some type of force, that he’ll let it go,” Miller said, describing what he was seeing on that play. “We really needed that. So just wanting to do anything to help my team win.”
Miller’s play ultimately allowed the Kentucky offense to run the game clock down to 2:12 and forced Auburn to use its timeouts before UK had to punt the ball back with 2:12 left.
From that point, all it took was one final sack from UK outside linebacker Sam Greene and a game-clinching interception on the final play of the game by safety Jordan Lovett to, at long last, put Kentucky back in the win column in a Southeastern Conference football game.
So on Monday, we can get back to assessing whatever Saturday night’s outcome may mean or not mean for Stoops’ future as top Cat.
On Saturday night, it was time to salute a Kentucky football team that has not “let go of the rope” — and which finally got some fruit for all its labor.
“That was awesome,” Boley said of the win. “A team victory. I’m really proud of our guys.”
This story was originally published November 2, 2025 at 12:55 AM.
