Cats Not About to Pack It in after Loss to UGA
Kentucky has been working for years to play in exactly this kind of game.
The result was a surreal week, with the Wildcats occupying a spot on college football’s national stage leading up to a Saturday showdown with Georgia for a place in the SEC Championship Game.
Enjoyable as the week might have been – from Times Square ads to a top-10 College Football Playoff rank to a raucous home atmosphere – it ended in disappointment. The Cats have some work to do before the next time they play in this kind of game.
“Really you have to give credit to Georgia,” Mark Stoops said. “They beat us in all phases. Really played a good football game. There’s many things we will take from this. We can learn an awful lot.”
UK (7-2, 5-2 SEC) didn’t give in after facing a 28-3 deficit, but the Cats were unable to overcome a sixth-ranked Georgia (8-1, 6-1 SEC) team playing at a high level, particularly with its ground game. Kentucky fell 34-17 on Saturday before a crowd of 63,543, a Kroger Field record since the stadium was renovated in 2015.
“It was a great atmosphere,” Stoops said. “Wish we had given them a few more things to cheer about but really appreciate it. That was a fantastic atmosphere, and again, that’s what it’s like playing in an SEC venue. I’d like to create it where it’s like that every week.”
Even as the Cats faced a sizable second-half deficit, most of their fans stayed until the bitter end. That didn’t escape the notice of the team they cheered so faithfully. In fact, Benny Snell Jr. cites that fact as proof of UK’s substantial progress.
“Did you see the fans, how long some of the good, loyal fans stayed?” said Snell, who reached 1,000 yards rushing for the third straight season. “Even when it was going down south, they were still out there. They were still supporting us. That just explains how far we came, how far we came as a program, how (much) better we’ve gotten throughout the season.”
Snell wasn’t disconsolate in defeat, as he has been in the past. Instead, he was taking an active role in picking up some of his younger teammates, reminding them of how much the Cats still have left to play for.
“Some of the young guys had their head down,” Snell said. “The leaders were telling us that we were—me, Josh (Allen), Terry (Wilson), Kash (Daniel), telling guys to pick their head up. We still got more games to play. It’s fresh and we’re fresh off the loss, but still got a good Tennessee team. We still got games that we gotta win. I feel them being down, but we gotta get up. We gotta get up.”
It’s logical to guard against a letdown following a game in which the stakes were so high. Stoops is certainly thinking that way.
“Any time you invest as much as we do into these games and put ourselves in that position, it’s going to hurt,” Stoops said. “You know, that’s what I told the team. We invested a lot, and I understand that. But we can’t, one, make this loss turn into two. So we have to get back to work and regroup and be committed on Monday.”
Wilson – who was solid in the passing game completing 23-of-29 passes for 226 yards and a touchdown – has no doubt the Cats will do exactly that.
“I know that my guys will come in and have that excitement on Monday, ready to go and ready to practice,” Wilson said. “I feel like it’s just going to (give) us more energy that we need to get better. That’s the thing about this team: Our mentality is to win and we’re not going to give up.”
Considering what UK still has to play for with three games left in the regular season starting next weekend at Tennessee, the Cats have ample reason to do just the opposite.
“This team is special,” Wilson said. “I know we’ll win out. The thing about this team is we’re not going to give up. We’re going to keep playing hard and keep getting after it. This team is special, so I know we’ll do big things.”
