LEXINGTON, Ky. – Tim Couch set school records with 36 completions and 398 yardsand threw four touchdown passes as Kentucky held off a charge topick up the 500th win in school history, 38-24 over intra-staterival Louisville in the season opener for both schools.

Couch, who threw 50 passes, was intercepted once and had hisreceivers drop a few passes. He broke Bill Ransdall’s schoolmark of 30 completions, set on November 9th, 1985 againstVanderbilt. Couch’s yardage exceeded by 25 the previous schoolrecord established by Rick Norton against Houston on November13th, 1965.

Kentucky made a successful debut under new coach Hal Mumme,whose passing offense enticed the highly regarded Couch not totransfer. Mumme helped the Wildcats improve to 8-2 all-timeagainst Louisville, including three straight wins in the series.The winner is awarded the Governor’s Cup.

Couch found Lance Mickelson for a 16-yard scoring pass midwaythrough the first quarter to open the scoring and hit JimmyRobinson from the same distance roughly five minutes later tomake it 14-0.

Anthony White, whose seven-yard TD run with 6:58 left in thegame helped thwart the Louisville comeback, caught a 41-yardscoring toss from Couch to make it 21-0 just 11:13 into thegame.

Louisville got a 38-yard field goal from Jon Hilbert on thefinal play of the first half to make it 21-3. The Cardinalssliced the deficit to 21-17 after Otis Floyd ran in from a yardout six minutes into the third quarter and Chris Redman threw a17-yard scoring pass to Ibn Green at 9:49.

Couch responded less than two minutes later with an 80-yardscoring pass to Kio Sanford, and Brian Johnson booted a 29-yardfield goal just under three minutes into the fourth quarter tomake it 31-17.

Redman hooked up with Green on a five-yard score with 10:20remaining, but White ran in from seven yards with less thanseven minutes left for the final margin.