Can Stoops Make Kentucky Wildcats Competitive in SEC?

Football coaches at Kentucky, on a little bit smaller of a scale than Vanderbilt, are simply faced with a tough task. How do you build a winner there? It’s not a football school but has to compete every year with Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and Tennessee.

With Florida and Tennessee down, this should have been the time for the Kentucky Wildcats to take advantage of winning, as they did from 2006 to 2010 with most of the SEC East down. But two bad years with Joker Phillips and a rebuilding year under Mark Stoops last year, when they went 2-10, took three of those years away, and the window might be closing if the Vols and Gators are back this year.

So what can Stoops do? Well, with lots of returning starters and two straight Top 30 recruiting classes, including a Top 20 class this year, he has them in a much better position to win than they have been in the past, at least from a talent perspective. The problem? This year’s 17th ranked recruiting class on Rivals was good for only ninth in the SEC and only fifth out of seven teams in the SEC East, and

Nov 16, 2013; Nashville, TN, USA; Kentucky Wildcats head coach Mark Stoops during the first half against the Vanderbilt Commodores at Vanderbilt Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Jim Brown-USA TODAY Sports

the 2013 class that was ranked 29th was good for second to last in the conference, ahead of only Missouri.

Obviously, recruiting still isn’t enough to help the Wildcats compete with the other Big Boys of the conference, but it could make them competitive out of conference. The next step requires great coaching and a unique system. The return of the Air Raid system to Big Blue Nation under Offensive Coordinator Neal Brown is a pretty good start. But there is one significant requirement for that: stability at quarterback.

That was lacking in Lexington last year after the Kentucky Wildcats offense had to deal with rotating two quarterbacks all year. This is where Stoops is going to have to start.

There is talent returning and some talent coming in to the Bluegrass State, but if the Wildcats are to have any shot at making a bowl game this year, it’ll have to start from behind center.