Mark Stoops begged for one break and got it in historic upset win at No. 6 Ole Miss

by:Jack Pilgrim•about 7 hours

NCAA Football: Kentucky at Mississippi — Sep 28, 2024; Oxford, Mississippi, USA; Kentucky Wildcats head coach Mark Stoops watches during warm ups prior to the game against the Mississippi Rebels at Vaught-Hemingway Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Petre Thomas-Imagn Images

Kentucky pulled off its highest ranked road win since 1977, knocking off the No. 6 Ole Miss Rebels in Oxford by a final score of 20-17. The Wildcats held the nation’s top-ranked offense to just 353 total yards and three scores after it had averaged 670.8 yards and 55.0 points per contest through four weeks.

Mark Stoops was like the rest of us when he watched Ole Miss kicker Caden Davis jog out for the 48-yard attempt with 53 seconds to go, a chance to tie it up and potentially send the game to overtime. After a season full of missed opportunities breaking the other way for Kentucky, he begged for one to favor his team for a change.

And then the kick sailed wide left.

“I walked up to Coach (Brad) White — we had played so good, he did such a great job. All of our coaches did,” Stoops said on the TV broadcast after the win. “I said, ‘One time. One time, we need a break. A block or a miss.’ We were fortunate to get the miss.”

The missed kick came after a go-ahead touchdown scored by Josh Kattus — a recovery at the goal line off the Gavin Wimsatt fumble. That score was set up following a 63-yard bomb to Barion Brown on 4th and 7, another huge break for the Cats.

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The ball finally bounced Kentucky’s way, getting rid of past demons to pull off the historic road upset. Stoops’ group never let go of the rope this season after hitting rock bottom in the blowout loss to South Carolina and they were rewarded in Oxford.

“It means a lot because we started tough, we had a brutal schedule, and our guys just kept on fighting. They kept on coming back,” Stoops said. “We took the No. 1 team down to the wire, and that’s no fluke. But we have so much work to do and we know that. We know who we are, but I love these kids and these coaches. They did a remarkable job.”