Kentucky Wildcats Football: Mark Stoops’s Monday Press Conference

Mandatory Credit: Jeff Blake-USA TODAY Sports

Q. (Question regarding South Carolina running back Mike Davis.)

COACH STOOPS: I really like him. I remember him out of high school and he’s a really good player. He is, he’s got great balance, great strength, you know, you look at him and maybe some people don’t think he’s flashy or whatever but he’s constantly getting positive yards.
Again, this is a typical SEC football team; they’re a physical team when they want to be and just like Florida. They’re physical, but if you notice that game they hurt us with finesse plays, you know? So you gotta defend everything and that’s where experiences come in and being good at a lot of things. And you have to do that. You have to dress things up.

Q. (Question regarding the team getting better in short-yardage plays.)

COACH STOOPS: I don’t know if we can completely change things. I think it comes down to execution. You have to be very precise and sometimes you have to be very tough if it’s a short yardage situation and we need to get better at both, execution and toughness.

Q. (Question regarding how important it is to have depth in the SEC.)

COACH STOOPS: Yeah, I think it’s very important to have depth. I think you can see from both those programs, Florida and South Carolina they have quality depth. It’s not a big drop‑off from either guy. Some might argue either guy may play better. I think we’re in the same boat, you know, we have two quarterbacks that I guess aren’t separating themselves, we wish they were a little bit more productive and playing better at that position but I think you need to have good depth in this league.

Q. (Question regarding UK’s penalties.)

COACH STOOPS: I think we’ve improved the last few games and hopefully we’re heading that trend in the right direction. I think we’re gettin’ better. I believe, what was it in the Florida game, three, maybe?

Q. Three.

COACH STOOPS: Yeah.

Q. (Question regarding his relationship with South Carolina head coach Steve Spurrier.)

COACH STOOPS: Yeah, known Coach Spurrier for a long time from the days when Bob worked for them, got to know him and his wife Geri, really their whole family, I know them very well. We see them from time to time on vacation at the beach. Coach goes to the beach, same place Bob does, and Bob has some places and we see them every now and then. I always love seeing Coach Spurrier. I have a tremendous amount of respect for him, only played against him once, and anytime you play an offensive mind like Coach Spurrier, you have to change things up. He’s very good, great play caller, and they have great balance in their offense right now, so it will be a real challenge but it will be exciting.

Q. When you say you need consistency out of your quarterback, how hard is that to cultivate other than waiting and hoping that it happens?

COACH STOOPS: It is, it is hard. We just practice and practice every day, and play our games and hope one guy takes charge. He hasn’t done that yet and I think like most people we feel the same frustration at times.
But like I said earlier, just to name one, if he wasn’t clearly the starter and not helping us, we tried that.

Q. (Question regarding seeing some consistency in practice.)

COACH STOOPS: Again, we look at ‑‑ Max ‑‑ once we made the move and were going with Max, he was doing pretty good in practice and gets hurt, still has a good practice then last week goes out in the game and doesn’t play like he was practicing.

Q. (Question regarding if he looks forward to facing an offensive coach like Coach Spurrier.)

COACH STOOPS: I do enjoy it, I do. I really like playing guys that I have a lot of respect for. It’s fun. You know, last week playing Florida and you see the personality in Will (Muschamp) and you see how the team plays, and I loved that challenge. And now going to South Carolina and playing Coach Spurrier, you know, it’s sleepless nights but it gives you a little fix (laughter).

Q. (Question regarding if UK brings in crowd noise for practice to prepare for road games.)

COACH STOOPS: Yeah, we do, we bring in crowd noise, yes. It will be a hostile environment that’s for sure, and I think you’ll see a team down there we know they’re going to play fast and furious and just lookin’ at, you know, just the way they started against Vanderbilt they had a chance to go 35‑0 in a hurry, against Vandy, and the one interception changed things a little bit, slowed ’em down, but they were on a roll.

Q. (Question on Max Godby.)

COACH STOOPS: You know what, he did good, and he’s going to hold that position as of right now. I think it’s very important to Max and maybe what he doesn’t have physically he makes up for with his determination and effort. It important to him, he plays extremely hard.

Q. Did Daryl (Collins) indicate why he didn’t throw the ball?

COACH STOOPS: There was some color (opponent jerseys between him and the receiver) and he just didn’t throw it. I wish he would have.