Kentucky Wildcats Morning Quickies: Wound-Licking Edition

Introduction

Tweet of the Morning:

UK season-ticket sales update: 46,368 total, 39,919 paid non-student.

— Kyle Tucker (@KyleTucker_CJ) September 1, 2013

Just a reminder that the apocalypse was not last night at 9:00.

Your Quickies:

Kentucky football

• Neal Brown's comments on the game. This gave me the impression that he and Stoops are at odds on the quarterback, and perhaps even on what the offense is supposed to look like.

• Ryan Timmons draws more praise than criticism, and I think that's good.

• I'm not worried about Drew Barker - he's blue through and through.

• Consider:

  One major problem was offensive tempo. Bobby Petrino doesn't run a no-huddle scheme, but still managed to run 75 plays to UK's 60. Whitlow missed on some important passes early, and though he and running back Raymond Sanders (14 carries, 98 yards) got some work done against WKU on the ground, that doesn't necessarily allow you to stress defenses into the demanding tempo that provides an advantage. The read-option was working, but UK clearly didn't want to just utilize that kind of two-man running game, and if you don't want to do that, you have to use the better passer.

  You can't run the offense at a high tempo if the other team controls the time of possession. I'm just saying.

• Five notes from the Western game. Trust me, they won't make you feel better.

• I might quibble with the order, here, but all these are right. The play calling really didn't seem strange, it's just the decision to play Whitlow and demonstrate that he's really the same QB we saw last year. The Air Raid is no advantage if you use it like that.

• This:

  Mark Stoops ON THE EMOTION IN THE TUNNEL BEFORE THE GAME: "I wanted to see more excitement out of our team. I’ve talked about that a little bit. I wanted to see (that). Normally, you’re trying to calm guys down a little bit before games and before scrimmages, and there’s a fine line there. Like I said before, I don’t want that being fake. I want it being real. I felt like our guys were excited and ready to play. We just didn’t execute very good. And we just didn’t play very good early. Like I said, they coached better and played better and got us in a hole and we couldn’t come back."

  Stoops understands, I think, what needs to be done. I'm anxious to see how he goes about doing it, and how effective it is.

• Kyle Tucker on last night's game:

  It was supposed to be a new day for UK football. Instead, it was more of the same. This team looked a lot like the 2-10 squad that got coach Joker Phillips fired last season.

  It sucks, but he's right. You know it, and so do I.

• Seriously? I've heard of irrational exuberance, but ...

Kentucky basketball

• This will make you feel a little better.

• You have to love Belmont for taking on the big boys.

• Tyler Ulis takes a visit to Iowa.

Other Kentucky sports

• Kentucky volleyball loses again on the road.

Links posts

• KSR — Sunday Morning Links

• The Leach Report — SundayWildcat Links

• John Clay's Big Blue Links

• John Clay's SEC Links

College football

• Florida tops Toledo, but not particularly impressively in a boring game.

• Texas A&M defeats Rice, but underestimated them.

• Mississippi St. falls to Oklahoma St. MSU is really challenged offensively, and their defense got worn down by OSU.

• Arkansas defeats Louisiana Lafayette in Fayetteville.

• Alabama handles Virginia Tech, but 'Bama fans are not happy:

  And let's go ahead and get this out the way — we have major issues at offensive line. DUH. Everything and I mean everything begins and ends with their ability to block and 2.5 yards a carry ain't gonna cut it. If tonight proved anything it was that, at least at this moment, we can't count on the passing game to drive the offensive bus. The running game has to produce some type of threat or the offense will grind to a halt. (VT actually out-gained our offense 212-206)

• Georgia loses to Clemson. Dawg Sports recognizes that this is not a sign of the Rapture.

• Tennessee crushes FCS Austin Peay, and finds a dark cloud in the silver lining.

• Auburn defeats Washington St., but not impressively.

• Missouri beats FCS Murray St. They are really celebrating over there. Well, at least they won.

• LSU defeats a very tough TCU team, probably the most impressive victory for the SEC so far.

• WTF, Johnny Manziel? Seriously?

College basketball

• Vanderbilt signs a nice player for 2014.

Other sports news

• Midlife crisis much, Rick?

• This is definitely bad news. DeAndre Liggins accused of several domestic-related crimes.

• Terminator, terminated.