Mark Stoops Press Conference
Mark Stoops News Conference
Post-Ole Miss, Pre-Eastern Michigan
Kroger Field Media Room
September 8, 2025
Opening statement…
“After watching the film, there’s two ways of looking at things – there was a lot of good things, in that we have to build on, and a lot of mistakes we got to get corrected, but we played winning football with much of that game, so we got to learn to capitalize, finish it off and play better in critical moments, but, did a lot of good things. Excited to get back to work today and get ready for Eastern Michigan.”
On Zach Calzada’s injury status…
“I am unsure, (he) will not practice today.”
On Zach Calzada’s mindset after last weekend’s game…
“Zach understands there’s things that we all can do better, that he can do better. And, we probably left some plays on the field. He’s resilient. He’s been around. He’s a little beat up right now, but has to get himself healthy and get back out there as soon as he can. He’ll be fine.”
On if you were surprised by anything after watching film of last weekend’s game…
“I don’t know about surprised or anything like that, but, you know, it’s a big unknown going into the second game with such a big challenge. And, I thought we did many things very good. We discussed it a lot going into the game. Ole Miss puts you in a bind. They put some stress on you, and I felt like some of that, we didn’t hold up with the hitches (short hitch passes). Somebody asked me after the game about tackling and all that. And you start watching it again, and I got a lot of things going through my mind right after the game, but watching it and the yards after catches, some of those things were frustrating. They probably had 100 yards on hitches, so you could get those things corrected.
“But they’re also a matchup problem, because then we did get closer to them, and they did hit a post (pass pattern) over our head as well. Not having DJ (injured cornerback DJ Waller) didn’t help but those are … credit Ole Miss with that. They put you in a bind, and they stress you, and they have talented guys, You look at the way we competed, the way we played them, and we played them very well. Obviously, when you give up explosive plays, it’s going to be difficult. And, for us, way too many explosive plays. Now you understand that is Ole Miss, that’s what they do.
“But, yeah, there’s a lot of good on both sides. I think we ran the ball effectively. We ran a lot of plays, which was good to see that you need to do against Ole Miss. We limited them somewhat. I think, like I said, it was 72 (total plays) to 70. That’s pretty good. Now, again, credit them with the explosives. We didn’t get as many. Two critical plays – we had an explosive that our receiver pointed to be on the line. He didn’t confirm it with the official. But, we’re six inches from an explosive that got called back and you can’t do that. It’s the same with basically the last play of the first half. We’re four inches from finishing that drive to perfection.”
On the offensive illegal formation penalty…
“I need clarification. Mac (Ja’Mori Maclin) was on (the line of scrimmage). JJ (Hester) was a yard off. Mac was supposed to be on, but maybe he was six – I think they called it on JJ, but he was a yard off the ball, on a legal set, so I don’t know.”
On the running game against Ole Miss…
“I think we definitely ran very well. The backs are very talented. I think we’re getting some movement. Again, you play Ole Miss, you know they’re going to be disruptive at times. So I think we just got to keep on cleaning up the areas where we can. There was some things that just the way we target things, the way we pull, we missed some things as well. But we’ll keep on building on it.”
On if there will be any big-picture changes coming after operation issues against Ole Miss…
“I told you I addressed it at half(time). I was very frustrated at half, and even after the game that was still lingering. You watch it, and again, some of it is inexcusable. It happens. In game two, it’s going to happen, you have to be able to overcome them. Our operation in game one was clean. The intensity picks up in game two, you add a lot more wrinkles, you add some different things. It’s very correctible, there’s things that, you watch it, and you’re so close. Like I mentioned, the end of the first half frustrated everybody. We ran four plays before it got out of reach. The first three plays were perfect, I mean perfection, and then the fourth play we were six inches away from being perfect. But it frustrates everybody because that six inches matters. Really, to be honest with you, i wish they had called a false start, and then no time would have went off. And when they didn’t call the false start, we were six inches from being perfect.”
On calling a timeout in the first half on fourth down, then coming out and punting…
“I wanted to go for it. We wanted to have a different back in and after that I decided to punt it. From my CAI report, from an analytics standpoint, that was the only one I was wrong on. But, we got the ball back two minutes later on the 30 going in. I guess I shouldn’t use hindsight, but it was a wrong decision, but in hindsight, that was the right decision (laughter from media).I think I’ll quit using that (laughter).”
On if you preferred to have taken a delay-of-game penalty rather use a timeout…
“I should have, I probably should have. I wanted to go for it, and I wanted it in that moment. I didn’t want them set (on defense). And again, no excuses. It’s wrong by us, you know what I mean. But then the second timeout was a good timeout. We had a bad play into something (opponent defense). We called a timeout, we scored a touchdown. The third timeout is inexcusable.”
On who will be Cutter Boley’s backup in practice if Calzada can’t practice…
“Beau (Allen) will get some.”
On Cutter Boley’s play against Ole Miss…
“It was good. I told him he has to protect himself. I told him going into it that it’s going to be difficult, protect himself, and he goes and lowers his shoulders and runs into somebody. I didn’t need two quarterbacks hurt at that point. The pass that he completed was beautiful. He was put in a tough situation. His second-to-last drive got us in scoring position and had the opportunity to score and didn’t capitalize on it. You asked me about the run on that down earlier, I think we tried to get it into a manageable (distance on fourth down), one of two possessions before that, we had 3rd-and-12, ran it to 4th-and-4, and converted a 25-yard play, so it worked perfect then, i think that was the idea, try to get something (to shorten the fourth down).
On if there is anything else the offense can do to help beat the press coverage…
“After the game I was frustrated at many things, but watching it again, there were plays there. And I did say that afterwards, that I felt like walking off it, that the quarterback has to pull the trigger and make some throws. For instance, not throwing anybody under the bus, it’s just true – I think we talked about the possession on the second interception, why not just run it, run it, run it. We called quick game on first down and it’s there. It’s there. So instead of 2nd-and-4, two guys wide open, maybe three, but two for six yards, one for maybe four. Instead of 2nd-and-4, it’s second and forever and kick the field goal. You can’t make those mistakes against a team that’s in the running for the playoffs and a very good SEC team. You can’t make those mistakes.”
On if Calzada is available Saturday, would he or Cutter Boley start…
“I’m not going to comment on that. I know this: I’m excited to see Cutter, and you know, I say that about every position, when somebody gets hurt, I never want to see a player get hurt, but when that happens, about every time I’ve been up here, I said, ‘I can’t wait to see so and so play,’ right? In fairness. So don’t overblow that for a quarterback, like everybody does. I’m always excited for the next man up, and I’m excited to see Cutter, and Cutter will absolutely play.”
On if you prefer your offensive coordinator to be on the sidelines…
“I’ve done it both ways. Some coordinators, I think Liam (Coen) might have bounced back and fourth. You just try to get the right feel for the team that you have. There are good reasons to be down (on the sideline), to communicate and talk, but also upstairs, you could put your notes, have your play sheets out and be a little more organized on what you want to call and set up and things like that. We’ve operated very clean. There are definitely some things we have to be better at, so we’ll continue to work at it.”
On if you spoke to Liam Coen after the Jaguars’ win Sunday…
“Absolutely (I saw they won). I didn’t (talk to him). We text before the game, so I haven’t talked to him since. We both are a little busy, but very happy for him to have that first win.”
On your impressions of the offensive line after its first SEC game…
“Yeah, I thought they did well. There was good movement in the run game. The pass game, you knew there was going to be more pressure, and there was, and it’s a bigger challenge, but they definitely protected to a point where we have to be comfortable enough to step up in that pocket and deliver the football. That’s what I mentioned after the game, and that’s the case after watching the film. Definitely contested, but definitely throws that are there.”
On what this team has to do to stress other teams’ defenses…
“We have to continue to get balance, right? You know I’ve been saying that for a long time. Last year, end of this year, we have to be better. At least we improved the physicality in the run game, the protection is better. We have to create some positive yardage in the pass game. We improved a little bit in this game, but again, we left some out there.”
On if your defense was as physical as you would have liked it against Ole Miss…
“I thought the defense did some really good things. I think a lot of the guys played well. Alex (Afari), we talked about after the game, after watching the film, very impressive, Kahlil (Saunders), I thought really showed up, was very disruptive, played one of his better games since he’s been here, and he’s been pretty consistent all year. That was really good to see. (David) Gusta got a lot of penetration, a lot of pressure. I thought even the edge guys were good. As we mentioned, they get rid of the football but we still affected him.”
On Eastern Michigan and Tanner Lemaster (former UK player who transferred to EMU)…
“I haven’t studied Tanner yet but Eastern is a team like all the MAC teams, I always say that, I always feel like they are very well coached. They know who they are. They know what they want to be, you have to beat them. We, as always, are worried about ourselves, improving and getting better. So that’ll be our point of emphasis here this week.”
On if you’ll use the upcoming game to solidify offensively, how you’re going to operate, what will be the go-to plays, etc…
“We discussed that at length yesterday and today, just making sure that we can be as smooth as you want to be. You know there’s going to be some substitution, you know there’s some specialty plays, but just settling in and letting guys play and being effective is something that we will continue to work at. And again, we’ve been extremely smooth in many places and others that we are falling short. With that operation you feel like there’s a lot of little things because the couple penalties really stuck out to me. But we are the second least penalized team in the SEC. It’s not like we’re shabby all over the place. I mean I wish we had one more penalty. I wish the false start would’ve happened (laughter). So there’s many things we are doing good, and I was frustrated again, I’ve probably said that 20 times today. But there are some areas that we know we have to get better at. It’s game two, we have plenty of new bodies, there’s a lot of good things and there’s plenty of areas where we need to work on.”
On if Seth McGowan is getting more comfortable after Week 2…
“Yes, I think just being on that surface and playing. I think he is more comfortable in the second game, yes.”
On if Seth McGowan can get more involved in the passing game…
“Yes. Yes, yeah without a doubt. Yeah, he’s definitely a guy we can get the ball to.”
On converting the red zone when the field shortens…
“Yeah, it’s a fine line like I mentioned earlier in the game. We get the penalty on the first run play, get it to the 15, or whatever it was, and take the sack. So we try to throw it on first down, to get an easy completion, get the ball out of his hands to not be predictable. And we didn’t convert. We need to improve in those areas. There’s plays where we try to take the shot to score a touchdown and then there’s plays to just keep them off-balance and move the chains. And we have been ineffective at this point.”
On encouraging fans…
“I think the only thing I can say to myself and to the fans, first of all, also, I’m glad you brought that up because the environment was great Saturday. I loved the atmosphere and appreciate the fans and the support. It really was fun for the vast majority of that game. I wish we could’ve finished it off but we are a better football team. This team is working hard and playing very tough, and working to improve.”
On an update on DJ Waller Jr.…
“More than likely he’ll be out this week.”
On if you’ll use the upcoming game to get more guys reps…
“I just want to play good football, no matter who’s in there. I want to play better and want to improve. We want to continue to work to make us the best team we can be.”
On the unexpected scores / wins / losses in the league through Week 2…
“I’m not sure, there’s definitely a lot of change going on everywhere and a lot of people trying to iron things out here early in the year.”
On if other teams’ upsets can be a good message for Kentucky…
“I think Ole Miss has a really good chance to make the playoffs and the way we played them Saturday, I understand the frustration, plays left on the field and things we could do better. The other side of that is there are a lot of things we did wrong. We know we can compete with anybody. We just need to continue to work extremely hard, do the things we’re doing well, continue to exploit them and do the best we can and improve in the areas we’re falling short, and there are many areas where we’re going to work hard to improve.”
On what you’re seeing from Jalen Farmer…
“Yeah, lot of good things. He was captain Saturday and he did a good job. He’s in the best place since he’s been with us. The way he plays he’s very powerful and he plays with a lot of intensity, brings a lot of intensity to that line. He’s been a great teammate and a very good leader, I like what I’m seeing out of Jalen.”
On how much Jalen Farmer changed his body…
“He has definitely changed his body. He works extremely hard at it. Coach Wolf (offensive line coach Eric Wolford) does a great job on top of the strength and conditioning (staff) and nutritionist and all that. There’s a position coach that is heavily invested and really pushing those guys to get extra lifts, to eat right, to do all the things. He’s (Jalen) really impressive with his body right now.”
On seeing Jager Burton’s progression …
“Jager’s played the best football since he’s been here these first two games, and that’s great for us and it’s really good for him. As I mentioned he’s a guy that cares deeply. He puts a lot into this. He works extremely hard, he’s another one physically that’s really done a lot. He’s a great leader, he cares, he knows we’re better with him playing center, and he’s playing very good football right now.”
On getting Kendrick Law the ball more, and what success has come from it…
“Again, two plays there, six inches off on alignment, to be more precise, there was an explosive there we could create. Just finding ways to get him the ball, he’s a strong guy that could make good plays for us, even getting him on the perimeter. He had some very good yards on the perimeter as well so we’ll continue to work at it.”
On what can Ja’Mori Maclin do to take a step up…
“It all works together, as I mentioned that quarterback stepping up into the pocket and delivering the football when we have plays. They’re going to be contested. There’s going to be guys around there. We just need to get a better comfort level of converting on those and giving guys like Ja’Mori opportunities down the field as well. That was a big play on Saturday and good to see, it’s something he’s worked on. I think just opportunities and continuing to work as a group. ”
On making in-game adjustments…
“The same way we’ve done it for a long time, we’ll continue to make the plays and make the adjustments and play ball.”
