SEC teams don't take days off during football season. On a weekly basis, Southeastern squads are pitted against some of the best teams in the country. Kentucky is, for occasionally better and often worse, no stranger to that. The Wildcats had lost 10 straight conference games before knocking off Auburn 10-3 last November.
That win helped Mark Stoops boost his confidence before ultimately being let go. In Stoops' last three years as head coach, Kentucky had the 13th, 8th, and 11th-ranked strength of schedule nationally. Of course, that includes the "gimme" buy games at the start of the year, as well as the usual late-season pitstop against similar competition, too.
Yet, under Will Stein, Kentucky's strength of schedule will take a massive leap, all the way up to No. 2 in the country. It's all gas, no brakes right from the start.
Stein Facing an Uphill Battle
Kentucky will officially kick of the Stein era with a game against Youngstown State on September 5th. From that point forward, Stein won't have the opportunity to ease into his first year as head coach in Lexington (not that he wants it). Look at how the schedule plays out in full:
• Youngstown State
• Alabama
• @ Texas A&M
• South Alabama
• @ South Carolina
• LSU
• @ Oklahoma
• Vanderbilt
• @ Tennessee
• Florida
• @ Missouri
• Louisville
Things get hot right off the bat. But Kalen DeBoer's Alabama isn't Nick Saban's Alabama, and Jay Bateman just came to Kentucky from Texas A&M. I am not saying Kentucky will win those games; they'll certainly be underdogs in both. But what if they did win? What if slight advantages turned into nail-biting wins?
Well, if Stein and his group are winning games like that in his first year at the helm, Kentucky will be a whole lot better than just about anybody thought they would.
The Wildcats have, in my opinion, a potentially elite quarterback in Kenny Minchey, who should be motivated after narrowly missing the starting job at Notre Dame. Minchey's former teammates rave about him, and the coaching staff at Kentucky seems to share the same positive outlook.
Minchey's ceiling may ultimately make or break this Kentucky team, but the pieces are there on eitehr side of the ball to warrant exciting preseason buzz, in the very least. Will Stein faces an uphill climb in his inaugural season, but I can almost guarantee he prefers it that way.
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