Mark Stoops likes his Kentucky football team off the bye week

The sky is falling around the Big Blue Nation, but it isn’t exactly raining cats and dogs on the Joe Craft Football Training Facility. Many fans are struggling to stomach back-to-back losses. Mark Stoops believes his team has the right mindset coming off the bye week.

“I feel good about the team. I think their mind’s in a good place. We have to play better,” the Kentucky head coach said Monday.

“As a staff we had time to sit there and watch it last week and really digest the things we’re doing well, and how do we improve on that? What are teams going to do to counter the success that we’ve had? Where are we falling short, and how do we improve on that? Certainly we have to be a smarter football team. We have to execute in critical moments and get rid of silly penalties and unforced errors and things of that nature. There was plenty for us to look at and improve on.”

Stoops sounded like a motivational speaker when describe his coach’s mindset. “I think you got to prepare, reflect and readjust a little bit. You have to.”

Set aside the coach-speakiness for a moment to consider this. We know Mark Stoops football teams struggle out of the bye week. The Wildcats are 5-8 under Stoops after a week off. As bad as they have looked at times this fall, he still does not believe his team is far from playing quality football.

“I felt like mentally we were prepared (against Missouri). We got to execute better. We got to play better,” said Stoops. “The game comes down to critical situations a lot of times and there’s things that we can improve on and play better and we’ve focused on some of those things in the bye week and in our execution. When the game’s on the line and and the pressure’s on we have to execute better.”

Big-time players make big-time plays in big-time games. There’s a big-time game Saturday night at Kroger Field and Stoops believes his coaches are putting his players in a position to success against the Volunteers.

“We have to coach it out of them and just become more efficient. Players either need to be challenged, corrected or encouraged. That’s not gonna change. We’re going to challenge people everyday. We’re going to get ’em corrected, coach ’em and encourage them to improve.” Stoops added, “That’s what we have to do and that’s a big focus that you look at in the off week.”

Injury Update

Kentucky was banged up in the Missouri game. Jager Burton was sidelined after 19 consecutive starts. He’s on this week’s depth chart, listed as an “OR” next to Dylan Ray. Stoops is hopeful the offensive line will be at full strength this Saturday, but he did not provide too many specifics on the injury front.

“I think we’re better. We’re certainly better than we were the last time we took the field. We’re improving, so hopefully this week we will stay healthy,” said Stoops.

Jalen Geiger remained absent from the depth chart, but Keeshawn Silver and Trevin Wallace were each on the two-deep after missing the Mizzou game. Daveren Rayner received his first significant snaps in Wallace’s absence and the head coach likes what the Northern Illinois transfer brought to the defense.

“I was very impressed with Daveren, really. He started the game very fast, he played pretty consistent the entire game to be honest with you, I was pleased,” said Stoops.

“He’s one of those guys that we’re constantly pushing to understand the nature of how difficult it is to play at a consistent level here and keep his weight up and be able to withstand playing in the SEC, playing every down, practicing at that level. But he certainly is the type of guy when you put him in games, he’ll show some ability and make some plays, which is good to see.”

Kentucky Defense Must get Cleats in the Ground

The uptempo Tennessee offense will be a topic of discussion all week around the Big Blue Nation. The Vols have scored 44+ points and averaged 441.5 yards in the last two meetings against the Wildcats. Even though it’s “almost impossible” to simulate that offense in practice, there is one clear point of emphasis for the Kentucky defense ahead of this matchup.

“Getting our cleats in the ground, getting calls, communicating and get lined up, getting set,” said Stoops. “That was a a piece of it a year ago where we were playing certain downs very well, certain plays very well and that tempo stresses some kids mentally and you can’t have that. You can’t have any major mental breakdowns.”

We’ll have more on how Kentucky plans on combatting Josh Heupel’s offense throughout the week. Until then, enjoy everything the Wildcats’ head coach had to say Monday afternoon at Kroger Field.

Subscribe to the KSR YouTube Channel for press conferences, interviews, original shows, fan features, and exclusive content.