The Bowl Dreams Are Gone

(Crowd at last year's Vanderbilt game) Well, the bowl dreams have come to an end with the embarrassing loss to the Tigers. This week we have the Commodores who beat us last year 40-0. That was a dark, cold rainy day in Lexington last year and all hope had been lost. That was a Kentucky team that had looked deflated from the word go. While it has been a long season it has been nowhere near as bad as last season’s product. We have a very good chance to beat Vandy this year. This is a team that has really struggled to make ends meet after having a really good season last year. (By really good I mean for Vandy and Kentucky standards) Both the wins and the losses have been close in terms of performance for both teams. With the exception of Florida it has been Vandy that was able to finish games which puts them slightly ahead of the Cats. This is a game where our defense has to stop the running game and force Vandy to become unbalanced. Our defense has to stop the run which averages just less than 150 yards per game. That will allow us to drop more into coverage and defend the much tougher passing attack which averages around 250 yards per game. Our secondary is already pretty scarce so they will need all the help that they can get to get this Vandy offense into bad situations. Our defensive line has seemed to disappear ever since the UofL game. This is where Kentucky has to win the game. If we can win the battle of the trenches on both sides of the ball we can win the game. While this is mostly the case in every game it is something that Kentucky has always struggled with. However, at the start of the season all we heard about is how big and mean this defensive line was. It is a work in progress that will only go up with both Stoops and Elliot at the helm. Our offense has been very stagnate the entire year. We have seen a lot of the same plays that have not produced any good results. In no way are we helping ourselves in terms of injuries that you cannot account for. Like always we need to get the running game heated up so that the passing game becomes easier for Whitlow. Our receiving core is depleted and the quarterback play has been anything but consistent. However, our future is extremely bright with the hopes of what we will have next season. What most people are forgetting about is Braylon Heard next season. This was a monster pick-up that people really don’t know about. This is an elite running back that averaged over five yards per carry at Nebraska. You can look at this game with optimism that this could be our first SEC win. But any way you slice it, you can look back a year ago and ask yourself, has this Kentucky team made progress from last season? I think it’s easy to see that the answer to this question is a yes, Kentucky has and will continue to progress. Go Cats! @camyoung_KSR