By KEITH TAYLOR, Winchester Sun
Kentucky’s defense wanted to make a statement against Georgia Saturday night.
The Wildcats were on a mission to stop the run and turned in a solid outing in a 29-24 loss to 12th-ranked Georgia Saturday night at Commonwealth Stadium.
Kentucky was 28-point underdog prior to the contest, but kept the final margin under double digits behind a rush defense that prevented the Bulldogs from gaining traction in the backfield. Georgia finished with just 77 yards, a season-low against the Wildcats. Kentucky surrendered more than 200 yards on the ground in losses to Louisville, South Carolina and Florida. In the Cats’ lone win over Kent State earlier this season, the Golden Flashes amassed 182 yards rushing.
“That was the goal, to come out, be physical and stop the run,” Kentucky linebacker Avery Williamson said afterward. “We really threw them off course by stopping the run with our whole defense and we did a good job with that.”
Kentucky gave up 49 points in last week’s loss at Arkansas, called with 5:08 remaining because of inclement weather, but followed by piecing together it’s best defensive showing against the Bulldogs. It’s an effort Williamson said the Cats can build on with four games remaining in the regular season, starting with Saturday contest at Southeastern Conference newcomer Missouri.
“I feel like it was a step forward,” Williamson said. “The loss still hurts, but we’ve still got a lot to play for. We’ve got four more games and we’ve got to try and win out for the seniors. We’ve just got to keep fighting, that’s the goal.”
Kentucky’s offensive unit finished with 329 total yards, with 206 of those coming on the ground. Georgia also converted just five third downs on 12 attempts.
“We kept our defense off the field by running the ball,” Kentucky coach Joker Phillips said.
Kentucky defensive coordinator Rick Minter liked the way his team disrupted Georgia’s rushing attack and kept the Cats in contention despite Georgia’s ability to complete passes with ease.
“It was a hard-fought game,” he said. “Our kids played their tails off. We stopped the run pretty good … We were a little bit better on third downs, not outstanding, but better than we’ve been doing.”
“We went hard,” Kentucky defensive back Fred Tiller said. “We were hoping to win and we played out heart out for the seniors and everybody.”
Georgia quarterback Aaron Murray had a career-high in completions (30) and yardage (426) against Kentucky’s depleted secondary. Murray threw four touchdown passes, including a 10-yard strike to Arthur Lynch with 5:39 remaining that forced Kentucky into catch-up mode for the remainder of the contest.
The downfall, Minter said, was eliminating big plays.
“We did not do that,” he said. “You have to keep getting better in the pass defense area. That’s way too many yards to give up and too many easy plays.”
Tiller said the contest served as a learning experience.
“Next week we should be good against the pass and the run,” he said. “We fighting, playing for our team, dignity, pride and everything. We have four more games and we’re still going to play our heart out.”
Williamson agreed and added the Cats aren’t giving up on the rest of the season despite being mathematically eliminated from the postseason.
“Quitting is not even in the picture,” Williamson said. “It’s not in our mind and it’s not in anybody’s mind. We’re not going to quit. I know it hurts, not having a chance to go to a bowl game now and I really hurt for the seniors. There’s not quit in my mind and none of these guys’ minds. We’ve just got to go back, correct our mistakes and see what we did wrong. We’ve just got to go out and be efficient next week.”
6 Responses to Kentucky defense wanted to make a statement against Georgia
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Great article!! Thanks for sharing it. I love the quotes from the kids (especially Tiller). I think we have some good players returning next yr. Williamson will be a senior, Dupree a junior, frosh have a lot of playing time to build on for next yr.
But next years team will still be “young and inexperienced”,and worst of all,still have the same staff.
If you have to give up over 400 yards passing to hold a team under 100 yards rushing, I would hardly call that a victory! KY played a better game, but still loss. It was the offense that gave us the ability to win this game. If Jalen could have stayed in the game, we would have won.
You cannot take credit for stopping the run, when you give up that much passing yardage!
You’re right Ben. The Cats just do not have the horses yet to be a complete team. Maybe next year. Still, the offensive showing gives me some hope for the future. I’ve had that same hope now for almost 50 years!
Larry, I can’t understand why Minter doesn’t have his LB dropping back in the passing lane. MURRAY had nobody between him and his receiver on a lot of his passes. I thought on passing down, weran the wrong scheme. The players, I thought overall played a Helluva of Game. We have a young team that yiu see is improving each week. When everybody is healthy this team can play with anybody. You know even though we lost to by 38 to Florida, our defense played good, South Carolina they played good for a half and last night they the team played competitive football for 4 quarters. You know UK have played 4 teams that was ranked 6 or lower in the AP polls at one point this year. Miss State is the only team that wasnt rank in the top 10,but they’re are about to crack the top 10 in the BCS poll.
Like Suzanne, I really enjoyed reading the quotes from our players. Even after the heartbreaking loss and one that makes it impossible for them to go bowling this season, these guys, one after one (and I’ve also read quotes from players on Sunday links found on Tom Leach’s site), are continuing to FIGHT. Indeed, as Avery Williamson is saying here, there is, indeed, “NO QUIT” in this team.. Honestly, I LOVE the “fight” and “heart” I see within these players.
Also, GeorgiaBlue, you make some excellent points here. Like you, I have found myself wondering what this team well might have done without all these injuries. As you’re saying, with everyone healthy, this team could seemingly “play with anybody.” Yes, there’s so much youth, and, yes, this team (minus at Arkansas when another round of youngsters had been put into the lineup, untested) IS improving weekly. By the way, many fans’ minds are stuck on what the defense — rather lack thereof — and the subsequent early losses against Louisville and WKU and have missed how some of these guys are “growing.” Yes, though, I, too, had noticed some improvement against Florida and then against South Carolina and MSU — and had wondered, even then, what this team could do if only one player, quarterback Maxwell Smith, were able to play. Then, of course, all the secondary injuries hit. We’re playing an entire secondary of true freshmen, besides minus our two quarterbacks around whom our offense had been built — and I truely believe we beat highly-ranked Georgia last night without a botched roughing-the-punter penalty! Frankly, anyone who misses how our grossly undermanned team fought last night is FAR too obsessed with who’s going to be our head coach next season.
Yes, it was still a loss, a painful one that means these young man cannot go bowling (and what a shame it is, to me, that either a missed two-point conversion on a trick play or a couple of questionable calls alone last night could have kept these WIldcats still in that picture with a much more reasonable schedule left on the books). YET, again, I am so proud of the FIGHT and HEART that was out on that field last night. Some within the fanbase may have “quit,” but these guys most obviously have not done so. I applaud them for that. As Larry said on the Sunday show this morning, our Wildcats deserve “a pat on the back” for their efforts last night — and probably the coaches, too. Back to its being a loss, though, frankly, it’s still “killing me” for those kids with those great attitudes, BUT it sounds like they’re already, rightly so, thinking of continuing to fight to get still better during next week’s practices! GO CATS!!!