Sat Feb 04 2012
LEXINGTON - There have been a lot of years when the Kentucky Wildcats could not play emotionally flat, minus key starters on both sides of the football, and beat anybody.
UK still struggles with that in the Southeastern Conference (see last week’s loss to Mississippi State), but the Wildcats were able to get past that on Saturday, pulling away from the Eastern Kentucky Colonels in the second half for a 37-12 victory at Commonwealth Stadium.
Kentucky improves to 5-4 and moves on to an in-season playoff game, if you will, this coming Saturday at Vanderbilt (12:21 kickoff, Eastern time). With a win in Nashville, UK becomes bowl eligible for the fourth straight season. There are some pointing out that six wins will not guarantee a bowl game given the number of SEC teams that could be bowl eligible, but forget those worries...if UK has six wins, some bowl will take the Cats.
Vanderbilt is the only SEC team that has no chance to go bowling.
The EKU win also marks a milestone for the Wildcats, who have now won 18 consecutive non-conference games. True, most of those wins have been over bad teams, but, still, a lot of good UK teams in the past played a lot of bad teams and did not beat 18 such teams in a row.
The EKU win also eased just a bit the sting of last week’s blown game against Mississippi State, though the only way to erase that pain completely would be to come back and win at least two of the last three games. Following the game at Vanderbilt, Kentucky plays at Georgia on Nov. 21 and home to Tennessee Nov. 28.
“I’m proud of this team for bouncing back and doing something that has never been done in this school’s history,” Kentucky coach Rich Brooks said Saturday. “I know we need to do a better job in the SEC, but no other team over a period of time - and there have been some good teams in this institution’s history - has been able to win 18 straight non-conference games. I think it’s a significant milestone and gives this program a totally different platform to build on and move forward to try to attack that SEC ladder. There have always been slip-ups in the past, and in this streak there have been some pretty good teams that this team has defeated.”
The Wildcats came into Saturday’s game knowing they would have to play without junior tailback Derrick Locke, who has two sore knees, but Brooks’ team received another significant blow literally just before kickoff when they discovered that sophomore star Randall Cobb would not be able to go.
Cobb injured a thumb in practice on Thursday that grew increasingly painful up through Saturday morning until finally doctors had to put a cast on the hand during pregame warm-ups.
Brooks is normally very forthcoming with the media about injuries, but Cobb’s predicament caught everyone in the UK camp off guard.
“Randall caught a ball on his thumb Thursday, and we didn’t think it was very serious, but it just kept getting sorer and he couldn’t move it,” Brooks said. “He tried a splint on it before the game but he couldn’t function with that, so we put a cast on it and just decided not to play him.”
Cobb’s reaction to not playing?
“He said he could still block,” Brooks said.
Brooks said UK did do x-rays on the thumb that were negative, so he’s hoping it’s a sprain and Cobb will be good to go next week. But, minus the team’s two biggest playmakers, Cobb and Locke, the Wildcats were in a sticky situation against EKU.
“We had our packages with Randall right up to game time, and we had to erase all that and try to manufacture some drives,” said UK offensive coordinator Joker Phillips. “We just didn’t finish all of them the way we wanted to.”
The final stats do not accurately show what a struggle this game was for UK most of the way. Kentucky rolled up 444 yards of offense against the 5-4 Colonels and played well defensively, and yet at halftime the Wildcats held a precarious 17-6 lead and were fortunate.
The Colonels were held to 264 yards of offense. Quarterback T.J. Pryor was just 9-of-28 passing with two interceptions for 137 yards, and no EKU running back had more than 35 yards. But the Colonels played hard throughout and did an admirable job keeping themselves in the game until late.
Kentucky was not really able to breathe a sigh of relief until freshman quarterback Morgan Newton threw a 14-yard touchdown pass to senior tight end Maurice Grinter late in the third quarter that gave the Wildcats a 24-6 lead.
Junior wide receiver Chris Matthews caught an 18-yard touchdown pass from Newton three minutes later for a 30-6 lead, just after underrated Kentucky linebacker Sam Maxwell intercepted Pryor deep in EKU territory.
Kentucky closed the scoring early in the fourth quarter when freshman running back Donald Russell ran 79 yards for a touchdown.
UK built the 17-6 lead early, thanks to a 1-yard run by senior running back Moncell Allen, a 22-yard field goal by Lones Seiber and a 1-yard run by senior back Alfonso Smith.
The Colonels’ lone TD of the first half came on a fake field goal and 9-yard run by junior defensive back Marcus Williams late in the second quarter.
“It was kind of a workman-like effort,” Brooks said of his team. “We had a hard time getting our offense untracked. The great news to me is that some our wide receivers stepped up and made some good plays. I thought Morgan Newton managed himself very well out there except for one (pass) that could have gone the other way. He threw the ball accurately, he had poise and he delivered it pretty much on the money. I thought he had a very, very good day.”
Newton was 20-of-29 passing for 187 yards with the two touchdowns and no interceptions.
“I felt a little better today,” Newton said. “This week was better than it was last week. And that’s what I’ve got to do, get better each week. Eastern is a good team. They were able to stop our run game for awhile and keep everything in front of them, but we just had to take what was given to us and we were able to make some things happen.”
And yet, despite Newton’s numbers and Brooks’ praise, Brooks said after the game that junior QB Mike Hartline is improving coming off a knee injury five weeks ago and that Hartline will start at Vanderbilt if healthy.
Go figure.
“Morgan has shown the ability we believed he had, and he’s been getting better in practice every day,” Brooks said. “He deserves to start unless Hartline is healthy. If Hartline can play and things aren’t going well, we have an option at this point for Morgan to come in. He’s been in pressure situations and, for the most part, has handled them very well.”
Matthews had a breakout game for Kentucky with seven receptions for 46 yards. Freshman La’Rod King and sophomore Gene McCaskill had four receptions each.
Russell had 92 yards rushing on three carries, Allen added 62 yards on 14 carries and Smith added 60 yards on 12 tries.
Comments
By Posting to this site, you agree to our Terms of Service Be polite.
Inappropriate posts may be removed.
State-Journal.com doesn't necessarily condone the comments here, nor does it review every post.
Login above or Register to comment.
0 Total Comments Home | Back
Copyright Frankfort Publishing Co., LLC 1995-2011. All Rights Reserved.
Content may not be republished without the expressed written consent of the publisher.
Content may not be republished without the expressed written consent of the publisher.
Dix Communications