Mark Stoops is tied with Bear Bryant on Kentucky Football's all-time wins list

Move over, Bear Bryant. There is another name on top of Kentucky Football’s all-time wins list.

Stooooooooooooooooooooops

With Kentucky’s season-opening win over Miami (Ohio), Mark Stoops moved into a tie with the great Paul “Bear” Bryant with 60 wins each as the head football coach at the University of Kentucky. Until Stoops matched the Hall of Famer, Bryant was the school’s wins leader for almost seven decades.

Kentucky’s All-Time Wins List

Rk	Coach	Wins	Losses	Years
1	Bear Bryant	60	23	8
2	Mark Stoops	60	53	10
3	Fran Curci	46	52	9
4	Blanton Collier	41	36	8
5	Jerry Claiborne	41	46	8
6	Rich Brooks	39	47	7
7	Harry Gamage	32	25	7
8	Bill Curry	26	52	7
9	Charley Bradshaw	25	41	7
10	A.D. Kirwan	24	28	6
11	Chet Wynne	20	19	4
12	Hal Mumme	20	26	4
13	William Juneau	13	10	3
14	Joker Phillips	13	24	3
15	Fred Murphy	12	14	3
16	J.J. Tigert	10	2	2
17	John Ray	10	33	4
18	Guy Morriss	9	14	2
19	Andrew Gill	5	5	2
20	J.J. Winn	4	3	1

Not one to take much credit for anything, Stoops downplayed his achievement when asked about sharing a spot with Bear Bryant after the game. Stoops said, “I absolutely respect (the record) and I’m very appreciative to be here a long time and have the opportunity to win this many games… I don’t know what to say. I don’t want to be disrespectful, but you can’t put my name in the same sentence as Bear Bryant’s in the long run. If I was competing for six national championships, let’s talk about that. But I am grateful to win that many games, to be here this long, and we have a long way to go and I’m excited to keep building this program. The focus is next week.”

Since Stoops wouldn’t brag on himself, his defensive coordinator, Brad White, made a point to congratulate his boss in his postgame remarks.

“Coach is so humble, he will deflect all of the praise but he deserves the majority of it,” said White. “I’ve been lucky, I’ve been sort of on the uptick when I came in the first year in 2018, you know, that was a 10-win season. I didn’t have to be on the ground floor and really grind through some of the tough building block moments. But it’s just a testament to how much he loves the kids and how much he loves the coaching staff. Again, we’ll try to keep the praise on him because he won’t do it on himself.”

Kentucky travels to Gainesville next week with a big opportunity to put Stoops above Bryant and to win a pivotal road game in the SEC East.