Vicky Graff Photo
Mitch Barnhart is patient when it comes to supporting his coaches and staff.
“We’ve been a place that’s embraced our coaches,” Barnhart said Friday. “We’ve got longevity with our coaches, and we’ve never overreacted to things. Maybe that’s something that people don’t particularly like about me. I’m not particularly caring at this point.”
During a football press conference on Friday, Barnhart admitted that last year’s 4-8 mark, including a 1-7 finish in the Southeastern Conference, wasn’t acceptable.
“We’ve got to get better,” he said. “We’ve got to fight and find our way to some more wins in a really, really difficult schedule. I was looking at our schedule the other day, and they said that — I’ve heard everybody say that we’ve got the second or third most difficult schedule in the SEC. I’ve heard fifth or sixth. Regardless, if you look at the schedule, it’s a difficult schedule.”
The schedule, Barnhart said, doesn’t afford Stoops and his staff the luxury of looking ahead.
“You take one week at a time — don’t try and get ahead of it,” he said.
As for Stoops, who is entering his 13th season and the longest tenured coach in the SEC, Barnhart is confident he can bounce back from last year’s dismal season.
“We’ve been in this spot where we’re coming off tough moments where we didn’t get what we wanted to do, and Mark is really, really good at fighting through adversity,” Barnhart said. “I’ve been so pleased with how hard our staff has worked, the way our players have worked, the roster we have in place.”
Kentucky offensive coordinator Bush Hamdan is back for a second season, and he seeks more chemistry within his offensive unit as the Wildcats blend in 30 newcomers with 27 returnees on offense.
“It’s a good challenge (and) it’s a good blend, but again, I think there’s year one issues,” he said. “When you get to year two, the ability for everybody to be on the same page is critical.”
Defensive coordinator Brad White agreed.
“The reality of the situation is you just have to figure it out,” he said. “We’ve got a whole bunch of pieces on the table right now, and we just have to piece them together. And we have to figure out, Hey, ‘what are the new guys doing best? What are they comfortable with?'”
Kentucky’s schedule isn’t doing the Wildcats any favors as Stoops works with a rebuilt roster stocked with transfers and a mixture of freshman newcomers. However, Barnhart isn’t putting a number on what would be considered a successful season.
“We have to do it on the field, and our league is unforgiving,” he said. “It is an unforgiving place to play football, but we’ve got to find a way to get better. You know me well enough to know I’m not going to sit here and say, It’s this number of wins, it’s this number of things. I’m not doing that. I’ve never done that. I’m not going to start doing that now.”
UK FB Media Day
Photos by Vicky Graff
8 Responses
It might help if our dumbass athletic director would stop making dumbass contracts with dumbass buyout clauses. We have a football coach that nobody else wants and we are paying him $9.5 million annually and he has never won an SEC championship much less a national title. He has not even played in an SEC championship game and worse yet, never won a division championship when the league had divisions. In other words, we are paying a top 100 coach a top 5 salary. How are we supposed to get better doing things like that?
Anyone with an ounce of common sense & an ounce of FB knowledge has to agree with you 100%. If anyone whines about it, then they are admitting they don’t know anything.
The OC is 4-8 at UK. Has he gotten a life-time contract from the AD or does he need to keep up the good work with another 4-8 season before he gets it?
Getting rid of Stoops is not the answer of our football recent struggle. The program has always had streaks of good and bad seasons .Been following them too long to know any difference , but i do think they will do better than lot of people gives credit this upcoming season.7-5 is my take. 28 days to go!
Hope you are right Cats79
No coach at Ky has ever won a SEC Championship or played in the Championship game and of course not a National Championship in 135 years. Now the "fans" thinks Stoops should be fired because he hasn't. DUMBASSES!!! It won't happen in the next 135 years. WHINERS!!! Enjoy what you get.
My point is this…if people like 79 and Jimmy are ok with the level of football that comes with Stoops, fine. I agree that we probably can't do much better in a coach, but we don't have to pay him $9.5 million a year for mediocrity. Cut his salary to $1.5 million and then use the other $8 million to buy better players.
Nobody is "ok" with the fact that the Cats hasn't won a Championship. Eight straight bowl games may never happen again. It seems that the money Stoops makes is the problem with A LOT of people. Why? 99% of his wages come from commercials and appearances. Not directly from UK. It's not money that can be used to pay players. My mom used to say, "you can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear". Ky football the sows ear.
Interesting perspective Jimmy