Monday Huddle: Kentucky's First Test

Kentucky’s football season started on Labor Day weekend, but the time everyone has been waiting on arrives in Week 4. The Wildcats mowed through three non-conference opponents to begin the season by outscoring foes by an aggregate score of 107-34. Kentucky owns a significant yards per play advantage (7.6-4.4), but that has all come against inferior competition.

Week 4 brings the start of SEC play, but this is also a game that the Wildcats should win. In Kentucky’s first road test of the season, Mark Stoops and his team will lay nearly two touchdowns as a favorite against a 2-2 Vanderbilt team. Clark Lea‘s program is coming off consecutive road losses to Wake Forest and UNLV while having failed to cover five consecutive games after pulling consecutive upsets against Kentucky and Florida last November.

Vanderbilt looks like the worst SEC team through four weeks, and this is a revenge spot for Kentucky. However, a road game is a road game, and the first travel trip of the year can be harder than you think. Add in the fact that Kentucky has not been a clean football team through 12 quarters to start the season and there are many unknowns heading into the rare September trip to Nashville.

What will we see on Saturday? That is anyone’s guess. KSR’s Monday Huddle is back to set the stage for another football week in the Bluegrass.

First Down: No shortage of storylines

Saturday will be the 93rd meeting between the two SEC programs. Kentucky owns a 48-43-1 series lead and has won the last three meetings in Nashville. There have been many boring lead-ups to this year’s football game largely due to mostly November meetings. In 2023, the SEC office moved this game up to September and is getting rewarded for that.

There will be no shortage of storylines this week.

— Ray Davis returns to Vanderbilt: After beginning his career at Temple, Davis spent two years at Vanderbilt and rushed for 1,253 yards, reeled in 34 receptions, and accumulated nine touchdowns. Davis was one of only four tailbacks in the SEC to reach 1,000 rushing yards in 2022. However, the tailback decided to grad transfer and landed at Kentucky. Through three games, Davis has accounted for 379 yards from scrimmage on 7.1 yards per rush and 15.9 yards per reception with five total touchdowns. Vanderbilt’s tailbacks have 399 yards from scrimmage in four games averaging 4.4 yards per rush. The Commodores miss Davis. The transfer is a huge part of Kentucky’s offense. Expect this to be talked about all week.

— Homecoming for Barion Brown and Keaten Wade: Back in the 2022 recruiting class, Kentucky dipped into Middle Tennessee to sign three blue-chip prospects. Kentucky has since returned to the area to land some more blue-chippers. Middle Tennessee is becoming an important region for Kentucky football. Brown and Wade will play a big role on Saturday. Expect the homecoming angle to come up multiple times this week.

— Revenge spot for Kentucky: Many things went wrong for Kentucky football in 2022. Even through a bad year, the Wildcats had a great shot to finish the season 8-4 and ranked inside the top 25. That went out the window when Vanderbilt stunned the Wildcats at Kroger Field in a game where the offense completed only 11 passes on 4.7 yards per attempt, and the defense allowed Vandy to convert 12 of 20 third/fourth downs in the 24-21 defeat. That was a signature win for Clark Lea’s program. Kentucky will be looking to return the favor in 2023 to extend the program’s winning streak in Nashville.

Get ready for a big lead-up to a conference that is significant for both programs.

Second Down: Kentucky’s big-play prevention will be tested

Under defensive coordinator Brad White, Kentucky has consistently been one of the best big-play defenses in college football. That appears to be true again in 2023. The Wildcats have only allowed two plays of 30-plus yards in the first two games of the season, and only one play has gone over 40-plus yards.

Kentucky’s bend-but-don’t-break style will be challenged on Saturday afternoon at FirstBank Stadium.

Vanderbilt quarterback AJ Swann is only completing 57.1 percent of his 33.3 throws per game, but the sophomore has 27 completions of 15-plus yards in four games with 13 completions of 25-plus yards. Vandy has played four games, but only Michael Penix Jr. has more 30-plus yard completions than Swann. Vandy goes big-play hunting on offense.

That could play into Kentucky’s hands. The Wildcats will show the second-year quarterback plenty of zone looks with a mix of single-high and two-deep coverage structures. Kentucky will look to force the inaccurate passer to dink-and-dunk his way down the field for an offense that has some issues in the run game.

If Kentucky’s typically sturdy zone coverage holds up, Saturday afternoon could be a long day for the Vanderbilt offense if the long ball is taken away. Swann was removed from the game against UNLV due to injury and could be dinged up in Week 4. The young quarterback has a lot on his plate. If Kentucky’s defense does not give up chunk plays, Vandy’s inefficient offense (No. 14 in the SEC in predicted points added or EPA) could have a hard time putting scoring drives together against Kentucky’s stingy defense (No. 5 in the SEC in EPA).

Saturday will be all about limiting the big plays.

Third Down: Devin Leary against a bad pass defense

Kentucky quarterback Devin Leary has been on fire over the last six-plus quarters of football. In his last 40 throws, the NC State transfer is putting up 13.4 yards per attempt with a 67.5 percent completion rate and seven touchdowns. The Wildcats will head to Nashville with an offense that ranks No. 13 in yards per play (7.58) and No. 13 in 20-plus yards plays (22). Much of that is due to the passing game.

Vanderbilt’s defense, meanwhile, has faced three FBS passing offenses and two of them ranked outside of the top 85 in QB rating. Despite that, opposing offenses are averaging 7.3 yards per attempt, In the loss on Saturday, UNLV turned to backup quarterback Jayden Maiava. The redshirt freshman put up 7.9 yards per attempt and connected on a key deep throw late in the fourth quarter to set up the game-winning field goal.

How it ended 😎

📺 @CBSSportsNet pic.twitter.com/zs9aWCFK1o

— UNLV Football (@unlvfootball) September 17, 2023

Vanderbilt’s defense ranks No. 86 in opposing QB rate. Defensive coordinator Nick Howell‘s unit has major issues at cornerback and has been picked on (12 pass plays of 20-plus yards this season). Vandy is fishing for answers at cornerback having switched cornerbacks and relying on true freshman Martel Hight.

Kentucky’s passing game figures to have a big edge in this matchup. If the Wildcats run away from the Commodores on Saturday afternoon, the passing game is likely a top reason why.

The week ahead at KSR

Week 4 is here, and the first SEC road trip is on the slate. As always, there will likely be a strong Big Blue crowd at Vanderbilt. To help get us to Saturday, we will provide in-depth pregame content from now until kickoff.

KSR will have full coverage of Mark Stoops’ press conference on Monday before taking a look at a depth chart that could have some changes. Subscribe to the KSR YouTube Channel so you can see the first Rapid Reaction of the season this afternoon. From there, practice reports and daily podcasts will take over as Saturday quickly approaches.

Over at KSR+, we will have a film review on Tuesday, a lengthy scouting report on Vandy on Thursday, and some against-the-spread picks on Friday.

Let’s play some SEC football.