Cornerback JQ Hardaway (6) knows Kentucky players have to look in the mirror and understand what each player can do better. (Vicky Graff Photo)
After going 0-4 in SEC games at Kroger Field after last week’s loss to Auburn and dropping to 3-5 on the season, how does Kentucky coach Mark Stoops keep the morale of his team from hitting rock bottom going into Saturday’s game at Tennessee?
“Again, it’s like that every week. It’s just brutal. It’s hard. It’s tough. It’s a tough league. We have to man up. Bottom line. There is nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. Our players know that and they got to get back to work and we have to do a better job,” Stoops said after the Auburn loss.
“I told them in there, it’s on me. And I’ve got to do a better job. We’ve got to get them in a better position to play better. We just all have to do a better job. Obviously, it starts with me and I know people get tired of hearing that but we are not playing winning football right now.”
Cornerback JQ Hardaway had seven solo tackles and an interception against Auburn. He knows there is only one way to bounce back
“Look at yourself in the mirror. Find out what you can do better, because everybody can do something. Don’t just try to point your finger to the next guy,” Hardaway said. “I’m saying just stand, stay in a hole. It is rowdy, you know, not going our way, but if we all just continue to go to work and believe in each other I believe positive things will come.”
8 Responses
how does Kentucky coach Mark Stoops keep the morale of his team from hitting rock bottom ???
Too late..,
Been there & done that.
how does Kentucky coach Mark Stoops keep the morale of his team from hitting rock bottom
Too late…
Been theee & done that
worry you are right
I really thought UK was going to be in the elite level of the SEC after the 2nd 10-win season, but that’s when the wheels fell off and now it looks like there aren’t even any training wheels.
Keep up the good work, Larry. It has to be a challenge to write about UK FB when it seems it’s only halograms running around with UK jerseys.
I wish he would say different things yes the SEC is hard its hard for everyone in it. Look at Vanderbilt they don’t even get top 50 recruiting classes most of the time. They still look much better than Kentucky does so there is no reasons for excuses. They’ve played in the SEC for a long time. I’ve never heard a coach use that as a excuse so much. Maybe that’s what the players think too. Wow its the SEC that’s are excuse to losing games we shouldn’t lose. Especially to South Carolina Vanderbilt Florida and Auburn. On paper we look much better than South Carolina Vanderbilt and Auburn. As far as experience and returning players go we had twice as many returning players. In reality we should have lost to Georgia Ole Miss Tennessee and Texas. Everyone else we actually have the better roster. This is just coaching errors and penalties and bad offensive line play and bad play calling and a bad secondary. The last 2 games the defense has played terrible. That’s from injuries and being beat up. Which is another thing that we do twice as much as any other SEC team. We are playing the worst football in the SEC. Auburn hadn’t won a game until they came to our home field and destroyed us. What makes it even worse is we lost to Auburn South Carolina and Vanderbilt at home. That should have been 3 more wins. The fact that 3 of the worst teams in the SEC beat us at home is when you stop making excuses and start to tell the truth. That Kentucky needs to change the coach. They also need to fire everyone on the staff but try to keep big dog which if mark stoops leaves he will leave. He is the only reason we ever have good recruiting classes but I’m pretty sure we can find someone who can at least compete in the SEC better. If Stoops doesn’t step down or take another job at seasons end. They need to fire him next year. There is probably to many years left on his contract to fire him now. So we might have to wait a year or 2 the problem with that is if he has a good year next year. Barnhart will give him another extension for every bowl game. So its almost like you have to root against us for a change otherwise Stoops will be here pretty much as long as he wants to be. The fans not attending the games would have a big impact on thiss. I say we boycott the remaining home games. You know there gonna kill Murray state. At this point I think Louisville will also beat us. We cant score points and they have a high powered offense. 3 weeks ago I would have said our defense will win us the game but with all the injuries that’s not the case no more. I think Louisville wins by at least 2 touchdowns.
We can speculate about what happed this year all we want but here’s a bottom line: We lost a lot of talent last year and have not replaced same. Player development, obviously, has not kept up. The portal has been ineffective. The new OC is having growing pains. If this were a business or a military unit or any other field of endeavor expect college football, the boss would have been gone a long time ago.
Back when Eddie Gran was OC and the Cats were running for 400 yds a game (and winning) the "fans" weren’t happy because Ky didn’t throw more. Stoops made a change to appease the whiners and it hasn’t worked out. The grass isn’t always greener on the other side.
You can’t get any lower than rock bottom and that is where we are right now. Just saw Thurs injury report. The Cats have 12 OUT and UT has 3. One can’t help but wonder how many of ours are HEART related. The team and staff have packed it in for the year and this is going to get real ugly real fast. This game will be cruel and usual punishment for the BBN.