Brad White on returning players suiting up for Florida: "We'll just see. It's so early."

Kentucky Football will tackle its toughest challenge of the 2021 season thus far when the Florida Gators come to Lexington on Saturday. The Wildcats will need everyone playing at full strength and with a clear head if hopes of an upset are to come true. Wan’Dale Robinson will be ready to roll despite a minor hamstring injury and the rest of the roster is looking quite healthy.

But more help could theoretically be on the way. The six football players charged with first-degree burglary all saw the Grand Jury decide to not indict them earlier this week, making them immediately available to return to practice. Three of those six suit up on defense and were expected to have carved out roles ahead of the season.

Sophomore safety Vito Tisdale, redshirt freshman defensive back Andru Phillips, and sophomore defensive back Joel Williams are all now eligible to play. The question now is how soon will they? Keep in mind that they missed out on 18 weeks of practice.

If you ask UK’s defensive coordinator Brad White, the three might not be suiting up this weekend.

“We’ll just see. It’s so early,” White said Wednesday about those three getting reps on Saturday. “We’re about three days away, we’re gonna need every bit of those days to evaluate and see where we are and if any of them are ready to step in. It’s hard for those guys. They’ve been out for a little bit but they’re working hard and doing the best they can in the situation.”

Of the trio, Tisdale was most likely to see the field on a regular basis this year. As a true freshman in 2020, the Bowling Green native recorded 20 tackles and 0.5 tackles for loss in 10 games played. But even though he has some experience, being thrown into the fire four games into the season would be a tall task to ask for him–mentally and physically.

“I think it’s both (mental and physical). It’s both,” White said about the challenges those three will face after missing 18 weeks of practice. “So much about football is getting reps but at the same time the physical aspect of it, there’s nothing like doing actual football plays, so there’s an aspect to both. Being mentally ready, the playbook, seeing things, you can’t replace reps in football.”

As for Phillips and Williams, the two saw the field sparingly in 2020. Missing the first third of the 2021 season surely didn’t help their development.

It could be a few more games before any of the three see the field, but just having them for additional depth is a small sigh of relief. Kentucky was already a bit slim in the secondary, so adding three players into the mix is always helpful. We’ll see if Kentucky needs to use them or not on Saturday.