Cats Hurting after Loss, Not Deflated
Mark Stoops could hear it in the silence.
His team was hurting after Kentucky had lost a heartbreaker, 28-27 to Florida on Saturday night.
“Those guys,” Stoops said of the postgame locker room, “you could have heard a pin drop in there because they’re deflated because of the amount of work and how hard they wanted, how much they wanted to win that game.
“The amount of work that these guys have done since last December to put yourself in a position to win that game, and really quite honestly, years, years and years of hard work to put yourself in a position to win those games. That’s what hurts.”
Once the players broke their silence in dutifully handling their postgame media responsibilities, the hurt was still very much there.
The defensive players felt like it was on them.
“We were supposed to win this game and we gave it to them,” linebacker Josh Allen said. “We gave them the majority of their points. We can’t let that happen again, so we gotta focus on next week.”
The offense tried to take the blame too, citing the two three-and-outs in three drives Florida capitalized on to erase a 27-14 deficit.
“In the fourth quarter, you’d like to get a little bit more—get some first downs, get the clock moving, keep our defense off the field,” tight end C.J. Conrad said. “I think that’s probably what we’re going to kick ourselves for, is we just in the fourth quarter became a little stagnant. That’s frustrating because our defense played their hearts out.”
Every Wildcat who took the field on Saturday had that in common. Sure, there were mistakes – two receivers left uncovered who ended up scoring touchdowns headlining them – but none were for a lack of effort.
“The breakdown in communication defensively on the two plays are really a sore spot because they stick out and it takes away from the great passion and energy that the team, that our team played with,” Stoops said. “We played winning football. We have to get those things fixed and I accept responsibility for those and we’ll get those plays fixed and do a better job.”
Just as his team is hurting, Stoops knows Kentucky fans are too. A sold-out crowd of 62,945 packed Kroger Field and poured everything it had into the Wildcats, but headed to the exits lamenting a 31st straight loss to Florida.
“It was a great atmosphere and I would like to see it like that every week and I realize it’s up to us,” Stoops said. “I imagine if we play like that and the players leave it on the field and play with that kind of energy and desire and passion, then we’ll have a great fan base like that every week. I know it’s up to us to play like that and as I told these players, that one’s going to hurt because of what we have invested.”
In spite of the hurt, UK isn’t done investing.
A loss as heartbreaking as Sunday’s certainly might pose a danger of deflating some teams, but not UK. Eddie Gran didn’t express the slightest concern about that.
“I don’t think it is (going to be difficult to pick players back up),” Gran said. “I think you all saw that tonight. They gave everything they had.”
And now they’re ready to do it again.
“We gotta grind,” Allen said. “When Monday comes, when tomorrow comes, we gotta forget it. It’s over with. When tomorrow comes, we don’t focus on yesterday. We’re going to have get better and better every day.”
