The Kentucky Wildcats’ hopes of a New Year’s Six bowl are gone, but with a second-half push, they could still get a January bowl in Tampa or another sun-splashed location.
By Matt Zemek
The journey to a season recovery – and to a record which enables the Wildcats to salvage their 2022 campaign – begins with this Saturday’s game against Mississippi State. Mike Leach has his team playing well in all three phases of football. This is not a soft finesse Leach team, either. His defense is bringing the goods most weekends. MSU has physically overpowered Texas A&M and Arkansas, and it has a chance to cause some trouble in the SEC West. Alabama has fended off A&M and Arkansas in recent weeks, which means that the two Magnolia State schools – Ole Miss and MSU – are next in line for the Tide. Mississippi State wants to enter the Alabama game without another SEC loss. Kentucky wants to ruin those dreams while also restoring a season which has taken a bad turn after the home-field loss to South Carolina. Let’s look at what Big Blue needs to do against Hail State:
1 – Manage Will Levis, manage the game
Will Levis will return to the lineup after missing the South Carolina game. Everyone could see that UK’s offense was completely lost without Levis. This will create a natural tendency to make up for lost time and expect a vibrant, dynamic performance in this game. That’s where we have to pump the brakes. It’s not as though Kentucky was flourishing and hitting all the right notes with Levis on the field. As excited as he might be to return to the lineup, this can’t lead to overly eager displays and impatient plays which lead to turnovers against a solid MSU defense. Manage situations with wisdom and prudence. Don’t try to be the hero. Be a winner who makes smart reads and good choices. That’s the key for Levis and UK in this game from an offense-first perspective.
2 – Line play
Kentucky allowed South Carolina running back MarShawn Lloyd to collect 110 rushing yards. On the other side of the ball, UK allowed multiple sacks against South Carolina. It’s true that with a backup quarterback in the game, sacks will sometimes be the product of the quarterback not sensing pressure or holding the ball too long, but it remains that Kentucky’s line play did not make the grade on a night when the Wildcats needed to control the trenches. Levis is back now, which might reduce the sack count for the UK offensive line, but the Cats need to hold MSU under 100 yards rushing, and they have a lot of room in which to improve. This team needs to get fired up and angry, and play like it.
3 – Punch MSU in the mouth
Leach is having a good year with Mississippi State, but we have seen his teams go into a road environment in the SEC and flinch when getting punched in the mouth. The Bulldogs will commit a key turnover which swings the game in favor of the opposition. Kentucky’s defense needs to create those high-impact turnovers against the Bulldogs and make sure Will Levis doesn’t have to win this game by himself. (UK probably won’t win if that happens.) The defense needs to put the offense in a position to succeed.
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