What we know heading into Kentucky vs. Georgia

After a stunning home loss to Vanderbilt last week, Kentucky’s backs are firmly against the wall in Week 12. Just in time for No. 1 Georgia to roll into town.

The challenge will be steep for Mark Stoops and his 10th football team in Lexington on Saturday. The Wildcats have all sorts of issues to figure out but two home games against the best team in college football and your biggest rival must be played first.

All signs point to the outcome getting ugly on Saturday, but football games are not played on Saturday. Let’s dive into the matchup to establish what we know before toe meets leather on a cold afternoon in the Bluegrass.

Rich Scangarello’s final stand

In many ways, the focus this week is on what will happen at the end of the season. On Monday, Mark Stoops fielded many questions about the state of the offense and what could change moving forward. Kentucky is headed towards a very important December where changes could be made to both the roster and the coaching staff.

But first, the regular season must be finished. Kentucky offensive coordinator Rich Scangarello has a very tough challenge ahead of him.

The Wildcats are scoring just 18.1 points per game against Power Five foes on a very unimpressive 4.94 yards per play. UK’s offense currently ranks No. 72 in points per drive, No. 85 in EPA, No. 88 in yards per play, and No. 92 in success rate. The best thing this attack has done is create explosive completions and those have seemingly disappeared since the bye week outside of a hot start against Missouri.

Kentucky is in a battle with that Mizzou team for the worst offense in the SEC at this point and the Cats have yet to face the best defense in the conference. That will change on Saturday when Scangarello’s offense goes against a Georgia defense that ranks No. 4 in points per drive, No. 5 in EPA, No. 7 in yards per play, and No. 8 in success rate.

The task will be tough. However, Scangarello has likely heard all of the outside noise in the Bluegrass this week. How could you not? There is a big two-game stretch to finish the year remaining, and a big offensive finish could help change things. We’ll see if Kentucky’s offensive coordinator can put anything together on Saturday.

It’s now or never for Scangarello.

Defense must be lights out

We’ve all known the issues with Kentucky’s offense this season, and they have been talked about thoroughly. Where the Wildcats have not struggled this year is on defense, but that was not the case in the 24-21 loss to Vanderbilt.

Outside of Tennessee, no other offense scored more points per drive (2.67) than Vanderbilt did on Kentucky last week. Brad White’s defense had respectable efficiency numbers (40.3% success rate), but the big-play defense was egregious as the Commodores had four plays of 30-plus yards, and all of those led directly to scores.

Typically, Kentucky’s big-play prevention has been very strong. That was not the case last week, and must get fixed right now.

Facing a Georgia offense that is an efficiency machine (No. 2 in passing success rate, No. 4 in rushing success rate), the Cats must not also give up the chunk play. Creating explosives has been somewhat of an issue for the Dawgs as Todd Monken’s unit ranks No. 7 in the SEC in plays of 30-plus yards.

Georgia is going to move the chains against any defense. Stops are only going to be consistently created if big plays are taken away. If that happens, long drives can bog down.

Kentucky’s offense struggles to score. For the Cats to have a chance in the matchup, White’s defense must create a bunch of stops. That only happens if the big-play glitchiness from last week is corrected.

Effort level

After the big swing game win on the road against Missouri, a huge talking point was that Kentucky brought its own juice into an atmosphere that hasn’t been wild when the Wildcats have played there in the past. Yet, in three games this season, Mark Stoops has questioned his team’s tenacity.

In postgame press conferences following outings against Miami (Ohio), South Carolina, and Vanderbilt, Mark Stoops has at least alluded to his team not playing with enough fire.

 “I just didn’t feel like the edge and the attitude and the chip on our shoulder was there all the time,” Stoops said after the season-opening win over Miami (Ohio).

“I don’t think our team played with the normal competitive character,” Stoops said after the loss to South Carolina.

“I’m sure the team is very hurt and embarrassed with the way they played,” Stoops said after the loss to Vanderbilt.

Throughout his tenure in Lexington, rarely has the team’s effort level been questioned multiple times in a season. But here we are.

Kentucky heads into Saturday as a big underdog against the best team in college football after facing a week of criticism within its home base. One of the most hyped seasons in recent Kentucky football history has quickly gone into a tailspin, and some of the problems are due to simply not playing hard.

Perhaps the No. 1 thing to watch at Kroger Field is just how hard the Wildcats play. Does Kentucky come out and play with its on fire? Or will there be little to no juice on the sideline on what will be another cold Saturday?

Stoops and his staff have many issues to correct this offseason. Getting consistent effort buy-in from the roster might be the top problem to solve. We’ll see if Saturday can be the start of correcting some of those issues.