Kentucky Adapting to Play More Man Coverage with Experienced Secondary

“Soft zone” became a four-letter word around Big Blue Nation this offseason. The bend-don’t-break signature style of Mark Stoops’ defense made Kentucky consistently one of the five best in the SEC. That all fell apart in 2023.

Deploying new starters in the secondary, the Wildcats’ pass defense fell from second to 11th in the SEC. Kentucky’s shortcomings were most evident in obvious third-down passing situations. The Wildcats couldn’t get off the field for a chance to beat Tennessee. The straw that broke the camel’s back was on a 3rd and 17 against Clemson in the Gator Bowl. Kentucky gave up 16 yards, the Tigers moved the sticks on the next play, then marched down the field for the game-winning score.

There is a certain segment of Kentucky football fans who cringe every time they see a cornerback line up more than five yards off the line of scrimmage. If I’m speaking to you, expect to see less and less of that this fall.

Cornerbacks Need to be “Sticky”

In Mark Stoops’ Kentucky football media day press conference, he acknowledged that the Cats played more man-to-man coverage last fall, but simply put, it wasn’t good enough. The secondary has to be sticky and embrace the challenge of covering SEC wide receivers in one-on-one battles.

“There’s times when we played man last year and got beat. Believe me, we mix it all up,” Stoops said. “There’s times when we have to play tight, we got to get sticky, we gotta get tighter coverage. We have to be able to win some one-on-one matchups.“

Brad White used the term “adapt” to describe some of the necessary schematic offseason changes coming to the defense this fall. While those philosophical changes are a must, it’s much easier to accomplish when he’s working with more experienced players.

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Kentucky Actually has Experience in the Secondary

Entering the 2023 season, Dru Phillips was the only cornerback with significant college experience. J.Q. Hardaway saw a few snaps as a true freshman at Cincinnati, but that’s about it. The makeup of this group is completely different. Max Hairston has one year of starting under his belt. Hardaway, Jantzen Dunn, and DJ Waller were all regular rotation players a year ago and are fighting for a starting spot.

“The nice thing is we have a lot of bodies that don’t have to take all of the workload,” said White. “We can distribute it across with guys like Jantzen Dunn and J.Q. Hardaway and Nasir Addison and D.J. Waller. Then you throw in true freshmen in there that have done really some good things throughout summer and the first few days of practice, so it’s going to be a really, really good competitive room. We’re really excited to kind of see how it all shakes out because that’s the one position I don’t know.”

It’s not just the cornerbacks who need the reps to execute in man coverage. Injuries at safety played a role in the secondary’s struggles a year ago, forcing true freshman Ty Bryant to play 45+ snaps in four SEC games. This offseason Kristian Story brought four years of experience at Alabama to pair with Zion Childress and Jordan Lovett. Kentucky has a true two-deep at safety, a room that White feels “really good about.”

“You got four guys that are SEC safeties,” said White. “They’ve played and been really successful in SEC games. It gives you the opportunity to be multiple in what you do and it also allows you to — when an injury occurs within a game, or maybe it’s a multiple-game deal — you’ve got the ability to absorb that. Depth is always important, and to be able to have the ability within a game to keep guys fresh, so that you don’t wear out through a game. It’s a huge advantage for us.”

If you need another reason to believe the Kentucky secondary is prepared to bounce back, take a look at the trends during White’s tenure as defensive coordinator. Prepare to see a sticky secondary this fall.

Year	Opponent Passing Yards Per Game	SEC Rank
2019	167.8	1
2020	224.6	1
2021	218.6	8
2022	170.8	2
2023	240.5	11