• Home
• News
• Obituaries
• Sports
• AP
• Services
• Citizen News
• Events
• FindKYJobs
• Classifieds
• Buy Photos
• E-Edition
• Subscribe
• Homes
• Marketplace
• Feedback

Coaches stand by choice of Hartline at QB

Print Story    |    Comments    |   

LEXINGTON – Kentucky head football Joker Phillips has steadfastly defended his choice of senior Mike Hartline to be the Wildcats’ starting quarterback for Saturday’s season opener at Louisville (3:30 p.m. on ABC).

Hartline won the battle after a competition that started in the spring and extended two weeks into fall practice. He beat out sophomore Morgan Newton and redshirt freshman Ryan Mossakowski for the job.

Hartline has started 14 games at Kentucky (going 8-6), including the first five games a year ago. His 2009 season ended with a knee injury at South Carolina in Week 5.

I wondered if Phillips and his assistants hoped that Newton, who started UK’s last eight games a year ago, would win the job.

And when Phillips announced last week that Hartline is the guy, it didn’t sound, to me, like a ringing endorsement. I wondered, again, if it wasn’t so much what Hartline did that won the job as it was what Newton and Mossakowski did NOT do.

The 6-foot-6, 210-pound Hartline has been billed as a quarterback with limitations that reduce him to being one who ‘manages’ the game - meaning he won’t win you games with spectacular plays, but he won’t make a lot of dumb mistakes that cost you a game, either.

Phillips was asked this week if he sees ‘managing’ the game as a dirty word.

“It’s not dirty to me,” Phillips said, laughing. “If we manage to win this game (vs. Louisville), it will be the cleanest thing I’ve ever seen.”

Phillips then defended Hartline.

“You know, Mike has won a lot of games, okay?” Phillips said. “I mean, the game he got hurt (South Carolina), he was the guy who was giving us a chance to win the game, which is the reason he’s our starter now. We say he gives us the best chance to win.

“I feel good about Mike’s ability to identify and get us in the best protection possible,” Phillips added, referring at least indirectly to the liklihood that the Louisville defense will show a lot of different looks and blitz frequently. “To know where the problems (from the U of L defense) are, to fix things. If he doesn’t have time to fix it, he understands how to sight adjust, which we call, such as quick passes.

“I think he’ll be fine.”

*
UK senior defensive tackle Ricky Lumpkin has one of the most interesting views of the Kentucky-Louisville rivalry. Lumpkin played his high school football in Clarksville, Tennessee, and his final two college choices in 2006 were Kentucky and Louisville.

At that point, U of L’s Cardinals were dominating the Kentucky series under then coach Bobby Petrino.

“When I was being recruited, a lot of people were going, ‘Why are you going to Kentucky?’” Lumpkin recalls. “’They haven’t won the Governor’s Cup (beat Louisville) since I don’t know when.’”

Shortly after Lumpkin arrived at UK, however, Petrino left and U of L’s fortunes took a dive, and now it’s the Wildcats with a three-game winning streak in the series.

“It’s flipped since my freshman year,” Lumpkin says with a laugh. “(Those days) People used to drive by our practices and yell, ‘You all suck!.’ ‘Get ready to lose!’ ‘Go Cards!’

“Now people drive by practice yelling the C-A-T-S chant,” Lumpkin says. “Just seeing how the environment has changed around here is great. I love it.”

*
Two of the freshmen making the biggest buzz around UK’s fall camp are running back Raymond Sanders of Stone Mountain, Ga., and Jerrell Priester from Ulmer, S.C.

The 5-foot-8, 185-pound Sanders has been likened by some to former UK  great Mark Higgs, with a running style reminding others of former NFL great Barry Sanders.

The 5-9, 170-pound Priester, meanwhile, is billed simply as an “athlete.”

Sanders is already a third-team running back, behind senior Derrick Locke and sophomore Donald Russell, while Priester should see a lot of action Saturday at in the defensive secondary. Though Priester could play and probably star at any position off the line.

Priester rushed for more than 10-yards per carry in high school. He has run a 40-yard dash in 4.29 seconds.

“Both of them have great natural ability,” Phillips said of Sanders and Priester. “Sanders reminds me a lot of Derrick Locke when he walked on campus with his leadership ability. He’s a guy (that came from a high school with 28 college signees last year) who, if you asked any of them who was the leader on that bunch (his high school team), he was the one. And he’s continued that here.

“The first week he was here, Derrick Locke came up and said, ‘I’ve never been around a smarter guy than this guy. He understands our checks, he understands our signals ... the tracks that the running backs have to make on each run and the pass protection.

“Priester has the same type of ability,” Phillips added. “He’s a guy who’s not very big, but he’s very aggressive and he runs well. He has a great vertical, which you have to have if you’re a small guy at a corner position. He’ll definitely play on Saturday. He’ll be an impact player before this year is over, also.”

*
The Louisville Sports Commission announced this week the creation of the Howard Schnellenberger MVP Award that will be presented annually to the most valuable player on the winning team in the U of L-UK football game. The announcement was made in conjunction with the athletic departments of both schools and the blessing of Schnellenberger, who has ties to both programs. Schnellenberger was an All-America tight end under Coach Blanton Collier at UK from 1952-55, and revived Louisville’s football program as a coach there from 1985-94.