Generally speaking, when the Missouri defense lines up opposite the Kentucky offense on Saturday, Missouri will know what is coming. Stopping it will be another matter.
Kentucky wants to run the football. Against Vanderbilt last week, the Wildcats ran the ball a whopping 53 times. Meanwhile, their offense attempted nine passes, which netted 18 yards. Mark Stoops’ offense runs the ball so frequently because it works; through seven games, Kentucky is averaging more than 230 yards per game on the ground, which ranks second in the SEC and 19th nationally. Running back Benny Snell Jr., the focal point of the Kentucky offense, has emerged as a potential All-American. Snell ranks third among all rushers in the country in attempts per game (22.9) and seventh in yardage per game (124.0).
Defensive coordinators often preach the importance of making an opponent one-dimensional; Kentucky essentially does that to itself. During its first five SEC games, Kentucky has rushed the ball on nearly 75 percent of its snaps. About 70 percent of its total yardage in those contests has come on the ground. Yet, the Wildcat offense has still been effective. That makes this matchup unique for the Tiger defense.
“They’re committed to it,” Missouri inside linebackers coach Vernon Hargreaves said of Kentucky’s ground game. “That’s what they’re going to do, and they’re going to stay with it. Even if you stop them, they’re going to keep on doing it.”
While Kentucky’s plodding offensive approach may stand out in a college football landscape dominated by pass-happy, spread offenses, Missouri players and coaches said the Tiger defense doesn’t plan to drastically alter its preparation for the matchup.
“It doesn’t (change),” Hargreaves said. “We just have to make more tackles.”
A few factors have contributed to Kentucky’s success running the ball so far this season. For one, the Wildcats feature talented ball-carriers and blockers. Speaking to reporters Tuesday, Missouri head coach Barry Odom called Snell one of the best running backs in the country. Quarterback Terry Wilson and running back Asim Rose compliment Snell. Both are averaging more than five yards per carry on the season. Odom also said Kentucky’s offensive line has been underrated, describing it as a “mean, nasty group.”
More unique is the fact that, even though opposing defenses often know Kentucky is going to run the ball, the Wildcats manage to keep them guessing as to how and where they’ll do so. Missouri linebacker Brandon Lee said the Wildcats “don’t do anything fancy” offensively, yet he proceeded to say they “play mind games” in the running game. Part of that stems from the fact that Wilson is always a threat to keep the football. Additionally, Odom said Kentucky uses its offensive linemen in unique ways to run the ball away from where the defense is expecting it.
“There’s a lot of different formations that they give you, and also some of the motion, the window dressing, so to speak, on trying to get your eyes to the wrong spot,” Odom explained. “But also, the pull game with either the center, the guard, the backside tackle, the offset tight end — once a guy pulls to the other side of the formation, well, there’s another gap, so you better have another hat for that.”
Just like Kentucky doesn’t do anything fancy on offense, Missouri players and coaches said the Tiger defense doesn’t have to do anything unusual to stop the run this week. Run defense has been a strength for Missouri this year; it ranks No. 35 nationally, giving up just over 130 yards per game on the ground. Defensive coordinator Ryan Walters credited the Tigers’ deep, athletic crop of defensive tackles and savvy starting linebackers for that success. One of those linebackers, junior Cale Garrett, said Missouri always prioritizes stopping the run, even when facing opponents that don’t rely on the ground game as heavily as Kentucky.
“That’s always the number one thing to do on defense is being able to stop the run,” Garrett said. “... Whenever there’s a passing situation or something, there’s always a chance of an incompletion or something like that, or we can get lucky, it can bounce off somebody’s head. But if somebody’s running downhill, that’s just easy yards.”
As Walters pointed out, Missouri has already faced some talented runners this season. Georgia and Alabama have both averaged more than 200 yards per game on the ground, and both have backfields with more than one talented ball-carrier. Memphis, Missouri’s most recent opponent, features the nation’s leading rusher, running back Darrell Henderson, and ranks sixth nationally in rushing. Even though Henderson missed most of last week’s game due to injury, Walters said the Tigers still benefited from preparing to face him.
“We’ve seen our fair share of really good backs, and this is just another one in that category,” Walters said. “That’s what can happen when you play in this conference. So you don’t change prep week to week.”
Missouri did allow Memphis to rush for 200 yards last week, even without Henderson. But Walters doesn’t believe that’s cause for concern. He said Memphis’ success on the ground resulted more from Missouri losing its intensity, rather than a schematic issue. Matching the physicality of Kentucky for the entire game will be key Saturday. Hargreaves pointed out that Snell has performed best late in games this season, when opposing defenses have tired.
“We can’t ever relax or take a play off or anything like that,” Hargreaves said, “because if we do, that’s when they get you.”
Already this week, there has been speculation that Kentucky will give some snaps to backup quarterback Gunnar Hoak, who’s considered a more traditional passer than Wilson, in an effort to diversify the Wildcat offense and take advantage of Missouri’s weak secondary. Stoops said on his radio show Monday that he would consider playing multiple quarterbacks. But both Hargreaves and Lee said they don’t expect Kentucky to alter its scheme too drastically at this point in the season. Missouri will prepare for the possibility of defending more passes, but the running game is Kentucky’s identity, and the Tigers don’t expect that to change any time soon.
“You gotta be ready for anything, but they’re going to stay true to what they’ve been doing all season,” Lee said. “They’ve preached that they want to run the ball and they want to be a physical team, so that’s what we’re preparing for.”
