Mark Stoops on the Future of Kentucky Football: Fundraising and Roster Turnover

The Kentucky football program is in a precarious place. As Mark Stoops acknowledged to open his Monday press conference, the Wildcats still have a quarter of their season left to play, and yet, it doesn’t feel like those games matter all that much.

Kentucky must win out — beating a Top 10 Texas team on the road and rival Louisville — to extend its postseason streak to nine. That feels unlikely. Kentucky football fans aren’t focused on how the team will perform in November, but on what will happen in December. Mark Stoops spent a good amount of time on Monday talking about what the future holds for the Kentucky football program.

High School Recruiting is Going Well

While the Wildcats are struggling on the field, those struggles have not bled over to the recruiting operation. Less than a month away from Signing Day, the 2025 Kentucky football recruiting class ranks 21st nationally with nine commits ranked as four-star talents by at least one recruiting service.

“Just take a good look at the great programs in this conference. To have a year off, here or there, it happens, so we want to stay away from that,” said Stoops.

“I think that’s where the balance comes in with high school recruiting and we’re off to a terrific start. We have some really good players that I believe some of them can come in and contribute and help, but as you know the portal will be key as well. Look at some of the teams and the transformation they’ve made from the portal.”

No Hard Feelings for Transfer Portal Players

One cannot exclusively rely on high school recruiting to improve a roster. Even though there will be fewer available spots than expected with a roster limit of 85 rather than 105, Stoops knows Kentucky has to have more hits than misses in this year’s transfer portal class. He does not believe there will be any hard feelings between the players on the roster returning and the new guys brought in from other schools this offseason.

“Ask any player on our team if they want better players with them. All good players want other good players. That makes everything better, everybody better. Competition is good, it’s healthy. Our players want good players. So, I love our roster, I love our young kids, but to think that you don’t need to supplement it is just stupid. You obviously need to supplement it,” said Stoops.

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Is Player Retention a Problem for Kentucky?

During last week’s call-in show, the Kentucky head coach was asked if we’ll see the big-legged kicker, Jacob Kauwe, any this season. He joked that he didn’t want to say too much or another school would poach him from the program. He was only half-kidding. If schools like Kauwe, Kentucky can’t hide him, but Stoops believes they have a pretty good track record of keeping the guys they want to stay in Lexington.

“We lose guys, but we’ve been relatively fortunate. It’s not to say we’ve lost guys that have chosen to go and try to get reps right away (rather) than stay and maybe play a year or two later. I think that the development part of it cost us a bit this year,” said the Kentucky head coach.

“There were some guys that I thought, just if I asked them point blank ‘Are you ready to play?’ they’d say, ‘Absolutely not,’ but they’re going to go somewhere else (to play right away).  Well then stay here and work and get better and continue to grind. I think definitely that part of it may hurt you; it has hurt us. But, we’ve been able to keep normally our tier one guys, for the most part, and hopefully, we’ll continue to do that.”

Stoops Believes A Bad Season Can Spark Positive Change

How do you get better players? You pay them. That’s how free agency works in college football. Will Kentucky have the money to compete? That’s a different question.

Annual pledges to The 15 Club’s 500 Strong group give the Wildcats a solid NIL base to attract talent. However, Stoops has not been shy about his thoughts on fundraising over the last year. Ahead of the season, he used colorful language when filing public grievances about this new part of his job.

The 3-6 season has not impacted recruiting, but will it impact the Cats’ NIL coffers? Stoops believes it may actually help the program, not hurt it.

“I hope it sparks (fundraising). I’ve seen it at other SEC institutions spark it, and I really want to stay away from that because I really get tired of it. I don’t want it to be like I’m whining or I’m crying or I need — you know it is reality, I hope we all understand that right?  It is true reality, like you have to, you have to have dollars.”

The school he is referring to is the only SEC school Kentucky has defeated this fall. Ole Miss’ victory over Georgia was seen as a collective victory by the NIL collective for drastically improving the roster, particularly in the trenches on defense, to get the Rebels over the hump and into the CFB Playoff. The issue for this SEC program is that Kentucky has more than one hole it needs to plug to get back on track.

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