Mark Stoops details Kentucky's struggles throwing the ball

The Kentucky Wildcats were ranked as high as No. 8 in the AP Polls this season, but have dropped out of the rankings following their 44-6 loss to Tennessee this past weekend. The Wildcat’s woes were highlighted by their poorest day passing the ball all season, which head coach Mark Stoops spoke about following their defeat.

“I think anytime at that point when we’re in predictable pass there’s things we could do better,” Stoops said. “I think there’s things where mixing it up and taking our shots on first, second down, things of that nature, when we did we actually hit one or two early.”

Kentucky found themselves in predictable passing situations early, as a 20-0 scoring run by the Volunteers in the second quarter put them in the position to where the Wildcats were playing catchup for the majority of the ball game.

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And they didn’t thrive, Kentucky had their worst passing performance of the season throwing for just 98 yards against Tennessee and failing to find the end zone by way of the air. Quarterback Will Levis also threw for a career-tying worst three interceptions on Saturday, was sacked four times, and ended the game with a 67.5 passer rating.

It may have been a tough night for the Kentucky quarterback and passing game, but as an entire offense they didn’t get much going, struggling to run the ball as well. The Wildcats rushed for just 107 yards as well, in a night where the offense wasn’t clicking on any cylinders.

“Predictable pass is not a good situation for us as you know, we’ve been struggling with it, we’re trying to protect at times but really it wasn’t just protection. We didn’t run it effective enough, we weren’t good on play action game, we weren’t good in the screen game, we weren’t good in any area,” Stoops explained. “You have no chance to beat Tennessee if you have 200 yards of offense and not enough first downs.”

There’s no question that Kentucky’s offense underperformed against Tennessee, but their defense didn’t do them any favors either, as they struggled to slow down the nation’s top-scoring offense. The Volunteers racked up 422 yards of total offense against Kentucky and had their sixth 40-plus point scoring outing of the season, and they did it with urgency, only possessing the ball for 24 minutes and 49 seconds of the game.

Hopefully for the Wildcats, their struggles can be fixed fast, as they take on a Missouri team in their next matchup that is fresh off of a win over No. 25 South Carolina, who defeated Kentucky earlier this season.