There was no way better way to end the type of streak Kentucky football wanted no part of.So many times before, especially to the Head Ball Coach, Kentucky had found a way to lose a game like Saturday’s. So many times before it was the other team on a brilliant 12-play, 68-yard game-winning drive (see Auburn last week). And so many times when Kentucky was behind by double digits, it meant game over.Not Saturday night. Not with this team. Not with this type of heart. Kentucky ended one of the notorious streaks that have tarnished the recent success of the program, pulling off a thrilling, almost unbelievable comeback, against the Steve Spurrier-led South Carolina Gamecocks. UK defeated No. 10 South Carolina 31-28 on Saturday night in front of 67,955 raucous fans at Commonwealth Stadium. The loss ended a 10-game losing streak to South Carolina, and, more importantly, finally put a loss column under Spurrier’s previously perfect streak against Kentucky (now 17-1).”What an effort,” head coach Joker Phillips said. “We’ve given this type of effort every week. We made a lot more plays today, especially in the second half. We challenged our guys at halftime that we were in a street fight.  We’re in a street fight.  I’m in a street fight.  I want to see who has my back.”Turns out, even without leading rusher Derrick Locke and defensive end DeQuin Evans; even after giving up 369 yards in the first half; even when fans started to file out of the stadium; even when there was no hope, the Kentucky players never stopped believing.”Finally,” junior Randall Cobb said, “finally we came through. We never lost faith. We never for one second thought that we were going to lose that game.”It turns out every single player had Phillips’ back in that street fight in notching UK’s biggest regular-season win since the upset of No. 1 LSU in 2007 and easily the biggest win of Phillips’ brief head-coaching career.”All 80 of (the players) had my back,” Phillips said.For the number of huge victories UK has had in its steady rise to football relevancy over the last five years, none may have been sweeter than this. For so long the UK coaches and players talked about the need to end notorious streaks like the one to Spurrier and South Carolina. Without tearing those streaks down, it would be impossible to make that leap from good to great. Climbing the Southeastern Conference ladder is impossible without beating the teams on the steps above you, former head coach Rich Brooks used to say.Consider UK’s victory over South Carolina, which defeated previously top-ranked Alabama last week, another step.”Thank god they got a victory because all of that work paid off,” defensive coordinator Steve Brown said.There are so many factors one could point to in the turnaround Saturday night. Quarterback Mike Hartline played another spectacular game (32 of 42 for 349 yards and four touchdowns); wide receiver Chris Matthews had another career night (12 catches for 177 yards and a touchdown); key defensive players stepped up in the second half (Anthony Mosley’s game-sealing interception); and the UK defense, after what Brown said were fewer blitzes, allowed just 103 yards in the second half.All that’s great, but the one constant – the key ingredient behind the win – was a collective faith from the players that never wavered.
“We believe in each other,” Matthews said. “Most of all, we believe in our coaches. No matter what happens, we have each other’s back.”But still, this team was down 28-10 at halftime – 28-10! This was the same South Carolina team that throttled Alabama last week and the same opposing coach that always escaped Lexington with a win. “This team doesn’t give up,” defensive tackle Ricky Lumpkin said. “At halftime there were a couple of boos in the stadium, but nobody said anything. We just went in at halftime, didn’t really make any adjustments and went back out there and played like we should have in the first half.”It was Cobb who just a couple of weeks ago expressed his disdain for losing and vowed to end the recent skid. It didn’t happen last week, but Cobb stayed upbeat and played in practice as, he said, “pissed off.”It would have been easy for him to fold two weeks ago or last week when the same old string of demoralizing streaks and losses started to resurface.”It’s hard,” Cobb said. “It’s hard not to give up. When times are rough, that’s when you pull through. When you can find the strength to pull through when things aren’t going right, that’s faith. That’s what happened tonight.”Finally, the hard work paid off. There’s no telling where the psyche of the team may have gone if UK would have suffered another heartbreaking loss to South Carolina. What if Mosley hadn’t picked off that pass? What if Cobb wouldn’t have sprung free on the 24-yard touchdown catch? What if the drive and game would have ended there on that fourth-down play?The mind and makeup of a 4-3 team is a lot different than the emotional torture of a four-game losing streak and a 3-4 record.”It’s crazy how things work in the SEC,” Matthews said. “A lot of people out there didn’t think we would even have a shot. Our stadium wasn’t even at full capacity. A lot of people didn’t think we could win. We came out there and we proved everybody wrong.”Now the window of opportunity is very much open again. From the gutter to glory, the goals that this team set at the beginning of the season are back in the picture.”It was a big win,” Phillips said. “We’ve got to get wins … but (if we get to) 5-3, we’ll have a chance.  We’ll have a chance.  The only way we can be 5-3 is winning tonight.”The only chance is having faith. “We’ve been fighting so hard all season,” Cobb said. “We’ve came up short a few times, but we finally found a way to win. We never lost faith. We never gave up. We kept fighting. We’re the comeback Cats.”