Mark Stoops says Kentucky has an imbalance of leadership

Kentucky‘s high hopes for the 2022 season are likely over after losing to Vanderbilt 24-21 last Saturday, dropping to 6-4 on the season.

Wildcats head coach Mark Stoops called on his coaching staff and his his veteran players to step up in the face of adversity ahead of UK’s huge matchup against No. 1 Georgia for Week 12.

“I still don’t question the leadership on this team – I think there’s a big imbalance,” Stoops said Monday. “I think there’s some really young players and players that maybe haven’t gone through the trials that maybe some of the older guys have and the appreciation that we have for all of the hard work that we did to put our program in this position. That’s my job as a coach and our job as an organization to teach and try to preach and do that.”

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The Vanderbilt loss, which doubled as the Commodores’ first SEC win in three seasons, is one of the worst losses in the Stoops era. Once ranked No. 7 overall this season, Kentucky is 2-4 in its last six games after a hopeful 4-0 start. Two of those games (Vandy, Ole Miss) were decided by one score in the final minute of regulation.

“As I tell the team a lot, you learn from scars, you learn from the beats, you learn from mistakes,” Stoops said. “Some of our older guys have been through that. Again, not an excuse, it’s just something I have to overcome is educating and putting all of our players and having them understand what it takes on a daily basis to compete in this league, to do the things we have done to this point.” 

Kentucky kicks off against the Bulldogs live from Kroger Field at 3:30 p.m. ET with CBS carrying the national broadcast.