Kentucky defense is preparing for 'heavyweight bout' against Tennessee

An argument can be made that Tennessee has the best offense in college football this season. Another argument can be made that Kentucky has a legitimate top-10 defense this fall. We’ll be getting strength vs. strength on Saturday night in Neyland Stadium.

Defensive coordinator Brad White and his unit at Kentucky know the challenge will be tough to slow down star quarterback Hendon Hooker. But the Cats are not going to be backing down from the fight.

“They understand the task that we have ahead of them, but they are not afraid,” White told reporters about his defense on Wednesday. “They’re going to come out, and they’re going to play fast. We’ll see what happens from there.”

“We gotta start out punching them in the mouth out the gate all the way to the end because if you start slow we’ve seen what happened to us last year,” super senior EDGE Jordan Wright told KSR.

Kentucky has a tall challenge, but this defense has consistently delivered. After seeing the Vols drop a fiftyburger on Alabama, the Cats are hopeful that they can learn from the mistakes that Nick Saban’s team made two weeks ago on Rocky Top. Kentucky will enter Saturday’s big game environment confident knowing that they’ve passed big challenges before. Plus that chip on the shoulder edge is almost never going to leave a Mark Stoops team.

“We’re not thinking about anything other than being the best versions of ourselves,” White said. “We know that we’ve gone into tough environments. We know that when we went down to Florida not many people were counting us as a defense that could hang with them much. So yeah, I think there’s a little bit of a chip.

Saturday could be a game of haymakers. Will Levis and the Kentucky passing offense should have some success against an iffy Tennessee pass defense. On the other side, the defense is ready to trade blows with an offense that ranks inside the top five of just about every statistical measure.

“It’s going to be like a heavyweight bout,” said White. “There’s going to be a punch and a punch, and it’s just going to keep going back and forth. At the end of the day, we’re just gonna have to punch until the end and see what happens.”

Kentucky does not sound like a team that is going to be intimidated on Saturday.

Kentucky’s defensive front must also win in isolation

Leading up to the SEC East rivalry matchup, much of the talk is surrounding how Kentucky’s secondary will match up with the most explosive passing game in college football. However, there are 11 players on defense.

If Hendon Hooker is given time, the super senior can slice up any defense within the current scheme utilized by Josh Heupel. Kentucky’s coverage unit is going to need the guys in the trenches to win some battles.

“Guys are going to have to play,” White said. “They’re going to have to win one-on-ones. They’re gonna have to win one-on-ones upfront. They’re gonna have to take on blockers and shock and shed. We talk a lot about the secondary, but a lot of this game is going to be determined there in the trenches. Our guys are going to have to play really good up there.

Entering Week 9, Tennessee ranks No. 29 nationally in run play percentage (56.9%) as in many ways this can be a run-first approach thanks to some heavy RPO and traditional shotgun play-action usage. The effectiveness of a downhill run game can determine the overall success of Heupel’s offense. It’s no coincidence that the Vols had their worst regulation performance (24 points) against Pittsburgh when the offense rushed for a season-low 106 non-sack rushing yards on 3.3 yards per attempt. Kentucky’s front needs to stop the run first, but they also need to influence the pocket.

Creating havoc has been an issue for the entire Kentucky defensive line outside of Deone Walker to this point, but it could be a necessity on Saturday night. When Hooker drops back to pass, Kentucky cannot allow the veteran to easily make throws from the pocket.

“You need to be able to affect the quarterback,” White told reporters. “Some of these routes are deeper developing routes. It takes a little bit of time. They’re going to need to affect that pocket. If it’s just a clean pocket where it turns into a seven-on-seven game, I don’t know if there’s any secondary in the country that can just sort of sit there and hang with that.

Kentucky will need a team effort on Saturday against the Vols. The offense needs to play complementary football, and the defense must get production and disciplined play from all three levels to find success against the No. 1 scoring attack in college football.