Kentucky Football: Wildcats showed fight in loss, only slight drop in both polls

The Kentucky football team put up a fight Saturday against the No. 1 ranked team in the land in Georgia falling in the end 30-13 and the pollsters took notice only voting the Wildcats down a few spots after Week 7.

Coming into the game the then No. 11 ranked Cats were riding a 6-0 start and focus of all the college football eyes on gameday. However in the end the Dawgs showed why they deserve the top spot, but UK showed it wasn’t an overachiever.

Kentucky football near consistent in both AP and Coaches Poll after loss

In the AP Poll, the Wildcats slid down to No. 15 receiving 723 votes, just 14 behind Coastal Carolina and 40 behind No. 13 Notre Dame.

Over in the Coaches Poll, they dropped three spots to No. 14, some 52 votes below Notre Dame and 62 behind Ole Miss.

In all, there are 6 Southeastern Conference teams in each poll in Georgia, Alabama (No. 4 in each), Ole Miss (No. 12 in each), Kentucky, Texas A&M (No. 17 in both), and Auburn (No. 19 in AP, No. 22 in the Coaches). Arkansas and Florida both fell out of the Top 25 and into the also receiving votes section of both with LSU getting some votes after beating the Gators.

Despite the win, LSU coach Ed Orgeron and the administration decided to part ways at the end of the season.

Kentucky (6-1, 4-1) still remains second in the SEC East behind Georgia. Tennessee is next at 4-3, 2-2, and with Florida’s loss, they fall to fourth place at 4-3, 2-3. South Carolina, Missouri, and Vanderbilt follow behind.

There is little reason to doubt Kentucky football should fall from the polls the remainder of the year and should be favored in nearly every game the rest of the season. How high they can climb possibly into the Top 10 remains to be seen.

Big Blue has a week off to heal up, access the season this far just past the halfway point, and prepare for a very manageable back half of the season’s slate of games.

Kentucky will travel to Starkville on Halloween weekend to take on a hard-to-figure out Mississippi State team that looks great at times and puzzling at others.

They return to Kroger Field on November 6 to try and put further daylight between themselves the rest of the East as they welcome Tennesse to Lexington. UK has announced this game is already sold out.

It’s then a trip to Nashville to play Vandy (2-5, 0-3), back to Lexington for a non-conference game against New Mexico (1-6), and then at Louisville (3-3) to close out the season on Thanksgiving rivalry weekend.

ESPN’s Future Predictor Indicator now has Kentucky with a 51.6 percent chance to beat Mississippi State where it had the Wildcats losing all year.

Their season-long loss has switched from the Bulldogs to Tennessee where they give UK a 48.6 percent chance to win.

I predicted all season Kentucky could finish 10-2 with losses likely to Georgia and Mississippi State but said last week that could switch to Tennesse instead. It is easy to see Kentucky winning both or splitting them. Losing both though would be a major blow and letdown to an outstanding season thus far.