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Wildcats ready to pay back Vanderbilt

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NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Kentucky coach Rich Brooks has a couple incentives to keep his Wildcats focused and ready for struggling Vanderbilt on Saturday.

First, there’s the matter of bowl history. Second? There’s the matter of a little payback.

Vanderbilt went into Lexington last season and beat the Wildcats 31-24 to become bowl eligible for the first time since 1982. That loss snapped a four-game winning streak by Kentucky in the series and helped send the Wildcats to Memphis and the Liberty Bowl at season’s end.

Now Vanderbilt (2-8, 0-6 Southeastern Conference) is possibly the easiest game left before Kentucky (5-4, 1-4) visits Georgia and wraps up the regular season hosting Tennessee — a team the Wildcats haven’t beaten in 24 games.

Kentucky defensive tackle Corey Peters said it’s fair to say they haven’t forgotten.

“It was one of our worst games last season, and we have a bad taste in our mouth. It’s a game we feel like we should have won, and we came out and laid an egg. It’s something we’ll keep in mind, but every year we play them tough,” Peters said.
A string of injuries, the latest the loss of quarterback Larry Smith to a partially torn hamstring, has ruined Vanderbilt’s hopes of the first consecutive bowl berths in school history. Now playing the spoiler and winning an SEC game are all the Commodores have left.

“It’s not a season we really expected to have,” Vandy defensive lineman Broderick Stewart said. “But I feel like going out here, this game’s going to be important and I’m going to do my best to make sure the defense is ready to play.”

The Commodores are not embracing the chance to be spoilers except as a means to an end.

“What that means is we kept them from winning. That means we won. That’s all I really want,” Stewart said.

Kentucky is coming off a 37-12 win over Eastern Kentucky of the Football Championship Subdivision. Vanderbilt lost its sixth straight 27-3 at top-ranked Florida.

The Wildcats will have junior quarterback Mike Hartline back from an injured knee for the first time since Oct. 10. Freshman Morgan Newton also will play, but Brooks said Thursday his starter will be a game-time decision.

Vanderbilt linebacker Patrick Benoist said it doesn’t matter too much considering Kentucky also throws in Randall Cobb at quarterback when he’s not catching passes, running or returning punts.

“They have a lot of different things they can throw at us,” Benoist said. “We have our hands full.”

Brooks, who uses Cobb to take snaps in what Kentucky calls the wildcobb formation, notes Vanderbilt has made some changes of its own after losing Smith. Mackenzi Adams will make his 11th career start at quarterback, putting a little more air into an offense that was pretty grounded with Smith.

But Brooks saw the Commodores use a wildcat formation against Florida, snapping to their freshmen running backs.

“I think they’re staying with the running game with the backs, trying to get a little bit of a wildcat package going and throwing the ball a little more with Adams. He’s a dangerous guy,” Brooks said.

Norman already is the SEC’s all-time single-season kickoff returner, and he has rushed for 658 yards. He and Zac Stacy could help Vandy attack a Kentucky defense ranked last in the SEC and 102nd nationally, giving up 188.2 yards per game.

Vanderbilt’s problem has been scoring. The Commodores are averaging a measly seven points in SEC games this season even though offensive yardage is up over last season. That might be why Vandy coach Bobby Johnson defended Kentucky’s defense.

“It’s not that they’re bad on defense. They just play other good teams,” Johnson said.