Tennessee football and Kentucky will square off again this upcoming season in the latest matchup of the rivalry. This will give Josh Heupel another chance to build on his undefeated record against the Wildcats in his Vols tenure.
With fall camp around the corner, I spoke with Justin Rowland of CatsIllustrated to get the inside scoop on where UK is at this summer.
Here’s what he said.
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What’s been the early impression of Will Stein? Expectations for this year?
He’s come in with a lot of energy and confidence for a first-time coach. He seems like someone who was prepared to take over a program even if he’s never done it before. The messaging, the branding, and the public relations have been on point. Some things the fan base had been frustrated with for a while have been addressed. In football terms, they’re now a destination spot for quarterbacks so that’s new and exciting. But given limited access in the spring it’s really hard to tell how realistic it might be to have a surprising season. Most people are going to pick Kentucky toward the bottom of the conference and the cellar makes sense objectively based on a new coach coming into the SEC after a couple of losing seasons under the last guy. If Stein can produce an offense that generates more excitement than in recent memory and they’re competitive for stretches against good teams that should be enough to continue their momentum in recruiting.
What does UK’s quarterback room look like this year?
Kenny Minchey is the guy. One thing Stein has said a couple of times is that they talked to the staff at Notre Dame and they were confident the Irish would have won 10 games if Minchey had been their starter. Obviously his context at Kentucky is different and he’s never been a starter so there’s a lot left to the imagination. In the spring game he looked pretty talented and very well coached. Behind him it’s probably Brennen Ward, who got spot duty last season.
How does the offense project around the quarterback?
Running backs CJ Baxter and Jovantae Barnes come from Texas and Oklahoma respectively. They’re experienced, all-around backs but have injury history and were treated carefully in the spring. The receiver room is very young. Nic Anderson is a variable because he had a huge freshman season at Oklahoma but that was two years ago. Tight end Willie Rodriguez should be one of the SEC’s best players at his position. They invested heavily in the offensive line so while it shouldn’t be one of the SEC’s best units it should be better than usual in a Year 1 rebuild.
What are the projected strengths and weaknesses of the defense?
That’s hard to say because there’s going to be a huge schematic change from the base 3-4 of the Mark Stoops era. That defense was really Stoops’ baby and with Jay Bateman coming in it will be very different. We expect more four down lineman looks and more aggressiveness to force mistakes, create additional possessions, and create more scoring opportunities. Football is a complementary game so the most important thing we know is Kentucky will be more of an attacking style team on both sides of the ball.
Do you have an early prediction, or is it still too early to tell?
I can’t predict them to win a ton of games against their schedule but I do think given NIL and the money factor they will be better than a lot of people expect. I’ve seen them ranked as low as the 90s in one preseason publication and that seems silly given the scarce number of Group of Five players taken in the draft. I’ll pick them to win five games.
