Kentucky Football: Stoops Leans on Experience to Prepare
By Chad Adams
Kentucky Football: Head coach Mark Stoops leans on a deep mix of experience, from personal, to his coaching family, to former mentor Jimbo Fisher, to prepare Cats for TaxSlayer Bowl
Though Kentucky is making its first bowl appearance since 2010, and the first during the Mark Stoops era, don’t get it twisted – this ain’t his first rodeo. Stoops, who hails from a family coaching tree within his own bloodline, led by “Big Game Bob” Stoops at Oklahoma, combined with his experience coaching under Jimbo Fisher at Florida State, has much premier bowl history from which to draw upon.
“… I’ve been to many bowls before, never as a head coach, but to be honest with you, the people here have made it so seamless, it’s been very easy,” Stoops said today in a post-practice press conference. “Our operations people, our administration, the folks here have made it very easy for us. There’s been no issues.”
“I looked at a lot of options,” Stoops added. “I took a lot of people’s schedules. Obviously I consulted with my brothers and I relied a lot on what Jimbo (Fisher) has done and what Florida State has done. I looked a lot at their format as well.”
Following Twitter today alone, one can see the football players enjoying a myriad of bowl game festivities, ranging from dinners, to time by the pool, to today’s excursion, Top Golf. Arguably the most important key to planning a schedule that will encourage the team’s success is finding balance between work and play.
https://twitter.com/UKFootball/status/814560718766936064
“There’s always a fine line,” Stoops explained. “It’s always like that throughout the year, it’s the same way. I really like our players to enjoy ourselves. … I want that balance to be there all the time. Obviously it’s a bit more of a challenge at a place like this because there’s so many guys. We’re traveling so many and there’s a lot more for them to do for many more nights. So we’ll start getting it locked in a little bit, pull the reins in more and more tonight and tomorrow, for sure.”
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Experience aside, the proof is in the process itself, to steal from the famous and frequently quoted Nick Saban term. While the correct type of schedule and preparation is key, it’s actually getting the team prepare that obviously matters most.
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“I think we’ve gotten our work done when we needed to,” Stoops said. (The players have) been very attentive in the meetings. … They’ve been locked in at meetings and the practices have been very good.”