Who up Memphis? Kentucky is now projected to go bowling!

What a difference a couple of weeks makes in Lexington, Mark Stoops sitting on a red-hot seat as head coach following a 22-point home loss to Tennessee and coaching for his job at Auburn, only for Kentucky to win two straight — the second in blowout fashion — to join the postseason conversation. In fact, the Wildcats are now projected to go bowling coming off the 38-7 win over Florida to wrap up the SEC home schedule at Kroger Field.

Who wants to go to Memphis? It’s a consensus for ESPN football analysts Kyle Bonagura and Mark Schlabach with just three regular season games to go, sending the Cats to Bluff City for the AutoZone Liberty Bowl. It’d be the team’s ninth bowl in ten years after its one-year absence in 2024.

They agree on the bowl, scheduled for January 2, and the conference. Their Big 12 foes vary, however — Bonagura rolling with Iowa State and Schlabach going with Kansas State.

Friday, Jan. 2
AutoZone Liberty Bowl
Simmons Bank Liberty Stadium (Memphis, Tennessee)
4:30 p.m., ESPN
Bonagura: Iowa State vs. Kentucky
Schlabach: Kansas State vs. Kentucky

Vibes are so good for the Cats that they’re even joking about Zach Calzada and his “Go get you some money, Garrett” nonsense leading up to Kentucky’s win over Florida. ESPN included the UK in a segment highlighting those trending up and down, Stoops’ group in the former.

Trending up: Cashing NIL checks

Cutter Boley threw two touchdown passes, Kentucky ran for 233 yards, and the Wildcats embarrassed Florida 38-7 on Saturday.

Afterward, we can only imagine QB Zach Calzada, smoking a cigar and wearing a velvet tracksuit, handed hundreds to each Florida player, patted them on the cheek and said, “good game, good effort,” before popping a bottle of Ale 8, spraying it on a group of confused groundskeepers and hopping into a limo with Ashley Judd and Secretariat’s great-grandson.

It’s better to be laughing coming off the win than talking about money phones being the downfall of the program coming off the loss.

UK not included in other bowl projections

Looking elsewhere, Kentucky appears to be close to postseason consideration — maybe others will feel better about including the Cats with a convincing win over Tennessee Tech next week?

Bryan Fischer of Sports Illustrated did not list UK in his update, while Steven Lassan of Athlon Sports said Stoops’ squad was “just missing the bowl projections after Week 11,” joining the likes of Clemson, North Carolina, South Carolina and Penn State.

Pete Fiutak of College Football News says Kentucky is in the “Alive For Bowl, Lean Out” category, joining Auburn, Florida, Mississippi State and South Carolina among those on the outside looking in.