Kentucky parents, from left, Nicole Key, Cisco Bryant, Donte Key and Terri Bryant celebrated after UK beat Ole Miss. Ty Bryant had four tackles and Dane Key had eight catches for 105 yards and one score. (Terri Bryant Photo)
Mississippi came into Saturday’s game averaging 670 yards per game and had dominated four straight non-SEC teams.
Kentucky came into the game without a touchdown in SEC play and only 2-2 overall including a disappointing 31-7 home loss to South Carolina.
However, the Kentucky defense limited Ole Miss to only 353 total yards and 17 points while the Kentucky offense churned out 336 yards and 22 first downs that enabled it to keep the ball for almost 40 minutes. That’s how you cook up a 20-17 upset road win over the nation’s sixth-ranked team.
Sophomore safety Ty Bryant had four tackles, including two unassisted stops, and said the UK game plan “was honestly what we did” on the UK Radio Network after the game.
“Tempo is something we stressed. We kept the play calling short and sweet (because of Ole Miss’ fast tempo),” Bryant said. “The D-line did a great job, the back line did and our linebackers did a really good job of tackling.”
The offense did its part with long, time-consuming drives that resulted in Ole Miss having just 56 plays.
“That is what we needed. I don’t go to the offensive meetings but it helped us a lot to be able to go out with full wind (after resting while the offense had the ball),” Bryant said.
Like most of the UK players, Bryant was more than just a bit giddy after the game and also admitted he had heard the noise about UK’s 2-2 start.
“This is big. I can’t wait to celebrate,” he said. “I have seen people downplaying us after the way we lost to South Carolina. (Safety) Zion (Childress) said it best when he said we played hard but the execution was not there (against South Carolina). The win today shows the world we are nothing to play with.”
4 Responses
The Cats finally had the football to fall their way for a change. Congrats Cats. Big win. Got to work on the O line. If the O line was a dam, the water wouldn’t even slow down.
I will give Griff a big yo-haw. That throw in the fourth Qtr that set up the winning TD was amazing. That throw was NFL quality. I’ve seen NFL QBs that couldn’t make that throw. The kid has a future in this game. If he could get just a little more protection, he would be unstoppable.
Way to go Cats.
The verdict is still out on this team. We have a suspended game win with Southern Miss, a one point loss to Georgia where we could have taken a shot to win but didn’t, and a win over Ole Miss where we did take a shot to win and DID win. Then we had the embarrassing fiasco of a loss to a shaky South Carolina. The stink from a loss like that takes time to wear off. Our next 3 games hosting Vandy and Auburn with a road game at Florida will determine our bowl eligibility. The games in Knoxville and Austin will tell us if we truly have stepped into the upper level of SEC teams. Murray State will hopefully be win number 6 and last but not least will be the game on Kroger field with Lousyville. Regardless of how the season plays out, this will be the game that lets us see if we have developed a winning mentality as in we don’t lose to Lousyville…EVER! We are 2-2 now; where will we finish? I see 7-6 as our ceiling, assuming a bowl win, giving us another middle of the pack season with Stoops…which may ultimately be his ceiling. That would eradicate the smell of the South Carolina loss but would still leave the question of are we getting our money’s worth for $9 million. A 12 game football season has little room for error. When you lose a game you were supposed to win it tends to wreck your entire season. Just ask Ole Miss and Georgia. Hopefully, the same won’t be said of our loss to the Gamecocks.
Our defense will keep us in every game we play. They are legit Top 10 good. The offense has been steadily improving, and if they can keep it up, then things get interesting. Hold serve at home, beat a horrible UF team, and then dream a little. The playoffs are not out of the picture…..yet.
Agree with you on the defense Len and dreams are always good