Mark Stoops sat down with the media earlier this week to preview today’s game at Georgia.
Stoops expects the Bulldogs to be in a foul mood coming off their loss at Alabama.
“Georgia coming off a loss, I’m sure they’ll be in a bad mood, like our players are,” Stoops said. “We’re just looking forward to getting back out there today and trying to improve.”
Check out his comments:
Here’s the entire transcript via UK Athletics:
Opening statement…
“Another great challenge here this week, going on the road and playing a great Georgia team, always a very big challenge, as we know. Georgia coming off a loss, I’m sure they’ll be in a bad mood, like our players are. We’re just looking forward to getting back out there today and trying to improve. As I said postgame Saturday, I really like this football team and the way they work and their attitude. Don’t expect any of that to change. We just need to be better, and we need to execute in critical moments and just become a better football team.
“It’s going to be a real challenge here. You know, great respect for Kirby (Coach Kirby Smart) and Georgia and what they’ve done. It’s a typical Georgia team, very good in every area, very physical, and make things tough for us, offensively, defensively. Really playing at a high level. Good at all levels of the defense, disruptive, strong guys up front, linebackers that could run, and very good cover guys. Offensively, a typical Georgia team, very big, very physical, run the ball extremely well, and a quarterback that operates within that Mike Bobo offense very effectively, and put a lot of stress on you. And I think they have always been talented and very good, but I feel like their receiver positions have even gone notch this year, very talented players. Great challenge, and another tough environment.”
On what Cutter Boley can learn from the SEC road game experience at South Carolina…
“You’ve heard me say it a lot, but it’s true, with every opportunity you have to learn from that, whether it’s success or failure, anywhere in between, you just have to get better, use that experience. We have to play better around him, too, give him that time. The first turnover, with the protection, there’s things we could do better there. Cutter will get better. The nice thing about him, he’s very resilient and has a strong belief in himself and the players believe in him as well.”
On what you saw from the offensive tackles at South Carolina…
“We struggled at times, technique-wise. Assignment-wise, we were pretty good, for the majority of the night, you have to be at 100% though, we weren’t that. Technique-wise, some guys were fighting it a bit, and a bit off, and can play better. And we need them to.”
On how South Carolina’s twist action affected Kentucky…
“There were a couple in-between, nothing we didn’t prepare for. Doesn’t make it easier, but there’s things that we were working and doing with that and the couple that stick out to myself, and probably you, were big plays. And that’s why I say the vast majority of the night we were on point there with our assignments. Technique, you’re going to get beat once in a while but our technique could be better and assignment-wise, there could be no time for that. I think experience does matter and with Cutter getting his reps, and seeing that, there are times we could get rid of the ball as well. We had one where we had LaNorris (South Carolina quarterback LaNorris Sellers) and we twisted and it came completely scot-free, but he kind of took the shot and delivered a completed pass. Those are things that we have to be able to do.”
On if DJ Waller had a setback in his recovery…
“It’s one of those injuries that, with a hamstring, that’s touchy. It’s very frustrating for him. He’s worked very hard and you heard us talking a lot about him in the camp and throughout the summer and he worked really hard and continues to work hard. It’s frustrating for him. For guys that have never been through that before, you try to educate him and help him and talk through it about how you feel like you’re okay, but then the minute you have to cover somebody and open it up, it’s just a different deal so we’ll continue to gauge that.”
On having been able to play some close games vs. Georgia…
“We just try to be who we are. Through the years, we’ve always tried to be very tough and very physical and play the game the right way. They’ve been, certainly, on the right side of the wins and losses. They have a great team. They’ve beat a lot of people and they’ve had a great program for a long time.”
On being able to come from behind …
“We are methodical right now and not overly explosive and therefore we have to play the game a certain way. I think we just have to continue to get better in all areas. Whether it be coming up just a fraction short in protection or the quarterback maybe missing a throw, or a receiver not coming up with the dynamic catch, you put it all together and it’s not a great recipe.“
On Tavion Gadson’s performance at South Carolina…
“He played really well, he did. He played a good game. He’s just a guy that really has fought through a lot of good injuries and works really hard and is getting better and better and definitely showed up in that game. He was very disruptive and played a good game.“
On if Jacob Kauwe was this consistent in camp…
“He’s been very steady. I wouldn’t say perfect through camp, but definitely a guy that you say, okay, here’s a redshirt freshman with a lot of talent and he’s been very consistent and I appreciate that.”
On how LaNorris Sellers affected your defense and how Georgia will affect your defense…
“Sellers definitely is a difference maker, you could see it in that game, we played a lot of plays very well, and he will do some things individually . We did a decent job, we let the one pass, the explosive pass for 59 yards. They had some other explosive plays that we could have shut down that he individually made, and you have to give him credit for that. That’s what he does, he’s a very good player and can also just sitting in the pocket. One of the best plays he made was when we had a twist and a guy coming right at him, he knew he was going to get hit and he delivered a strike, that’s hard to overcome. Gunner (Georgia QB Gunner Stockton) is a guy that is most definitely a dual-threat guy, and he operates this offense very well. He’s a guy that makes very good decisions, he could hurt you with his legs and buy himself enough time. He has just enough speed and athletic ability to really hurt you when he wants to but he also operates the offense very efficiently.”
On the wide receiver room…
“The older guys have worked really hard and have been very consistent through practice and give us the best opportunities. We’re waiting for all those guys to emerge. With guys coming back up off injury and different things, we need them all to continue to progress, and we just haven’t had the consistency that we’d like. Hardley (Gilmore) is a guy, he gets in there in the games and he plays really hard and can do some things for us and we need him to continue to come along and mature because he can definitely make some contested catches for us as well.”
On how else you can get Kendrick Law involved in the offense…
“We targeted him quite a bit this past week. We’re trying to get him the ball. We know he’s one of those guys, he’s a big and strong guy, one of the jets right in front of our bench there. He’s very physical and he’s hard to bring down. He’s definitely a guy that can make some plays for us, we’re trying a lot of ways to get him the ball along with some of the other guys.”
On travelling with three quarterbacks vs. four quarterbacks…
“You most definitely don’t have enough time to get ready for a game plan with four quarterbacks. There’s just not enough time. During the week and reps, with bodies and things of that nature. We were trying to bring four and rotate those younger guys and we will, but we needed some guys with depth whether it be in special teams or different areas. Here this past week, we actually had to make a late switch with one of them.”
On what you say to Cutter Boley after a turnover to stay positive…
“We all know we can’t overcome turnovers, we just can’t do it. There’s not many people that can, certainly in our league with the way we’re built right now, we just can’t overcome turnovers like that. Some of it’s going to happen, it isn’t always all on him. We talked about the protection and the twist game, and it hit us, it caused the sack fumble right there, I mean a sack we could live with we could pin them down and try to get a turnover ourselves. The throw on the RPO, the slant, he missed it by a half-yard. I think that comes with experience and reps and I don’t want to slow him down on that. That’s something that we need to progress. I’m not trying to make an excuse but the tip right there was a little unfortunate for us, he gets the pick six, they have a tip that converts to a first down, a little bit of that. We forced an errant throw and it gets to be a completion, and unfortunately Cutter gets the tip for a touchdown. Hopefully that’s not going to happen much so we have to continue to be aggressive and get him better in that area. One of them on the throw late, absolutely inexcusable there, the one he kind of heaved up there. That comes with him being young and really trying to make a play and help his team, but you know we can’t have that.”
On Cutter Boley needing a lot of protection for long throws and if he needs to look at getting it out quicker…
“Yes and no, I think we have to look at things to make sure he knows where to go with the ball right now. That can correlate to people we play against, when our pressures come in, they know what’s coming, and we’re scot-free, but they still can get rid of it. So I think we as a staff have to make sure we’re putting him in a position that he understands, if pressure comes, where he can evade and where to go with the football. I think it’s a combination of that, just eating it sometimes and taking a sack. Then sometimes he can get rid of the football. And other times we have to make sure we’re putting him in a successful position, at least to be able to make a throw. So there’s a lot of things to look at that way.”
On Daveren Rayner so far this season…
“Yeah, he’s been very solid. I think defensively, it happens a lot. For us, I think we play a vast majority of the game very good. And then there’s some critical plays in there. Even for him, even for Dave, there was a play or two that were critical moments that aren’t acceptable to us, that he can be better at. But I love his attitude, his energy, and instinctually, he’s doing a good job. As I mentioned postgame, and it’s true after watching the film, there are some critical moments that we have to execute and be on point.”
On how much Daveren Rayner’s redshirt season helped him…
“Yeah it definitely helped him, it did. That’s a situation where it was a good thing.”
On if you would consider Cutter Boley a resilient guy…
“Yeah, definitely a good question. And I absolutely do. He’s just one of those guys, he’s just getting started. He’s very young in this process. For young players that are very talented, they feel like, okay, wait a minute, I just sat one whole year, I’m ready to go. And that’s pretty hard, pretty difficult for anybody. But he is very resilient. He has a strong belief in himself. The players believe in him. He has the talent, so he’ll continue to work and get better. I don’t anticipate he’s the type of player that will get affected by that.”
On your dialogue with Cutter Boley…
“Like I said, it’s very early in this process right now, but it’s very much like that. When I saw him and visited with him after the game, he had a good attitude, head was up and he’ll be fine.”
On how the rest of the team can balance out offensive turnovers…
“Of course, we always talk about that and takeaways. You look at us going into that game and we had a decent amount of interceptions; fumbles, there were some balls on the ground that we weren’t able to get. That’s kind of a balance sometimes, so we’ve been doing a decent job with that. Didn’t get any Saturday, credit to them. There were some opportunities that, again just a fraction off. One in particular that LaNorris ended up making a positive play out of, that we had him contained and we had it set up where we needed somebody to set it high and it wasn’t high enough, he got around it and made us pay. So credit him with some of that. I think special teams-wise, I was very pleased. I talked about it here last Monday, how much they could hurt you on special teams, and I thought our guys played really well and had a really positive impact and were really on the plus side of that hidden yardage on special teams which is really very difficult to do against them.”
On winning the toss and electing to receive and scoring on the first two drives…
“I felt like at the time with an energetic crowd like that and an opportunity, we wanted to take the ball and try to have a positive outcome. And our guys were ready to play. And I think physically upfront our O-Line wanted to do that. It was really nice to get the ball and score. On the other side of that, I thought as I mentioned, giving up the touchdown with their first offensive possession. It was kind of frustrating.”
On Alabama’s third-down conversions …
“It was two very good teams going at it, you know they are both very good.”
On the Georgia pass rush after the pressure against Cutter Boley at South Carolina …
“We’re worried about ourselves, protecting. I think you know that coming off a game where pressure just hurt us. We just try to go out there each and every week and improve and get better”
