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December 17, 2024

Montavin Quisenberry Named Kentucky Mr. Football
All-purpose player amassed more than 8,000 total offensive yards at Boyle County High School

LEXINGTON, Ky. – Kentucky signee Montavin Quisenberry, an all-purpose star from a historically powerful Boyle County High School program, has been named Kentucky Mr. Football by the Kentucky Football Coaches Association, it was announced Tuesday. He swept the Commonwealth’s top awards, recently winning the Paul Hornung Award from the Louisville Quarterback Club and the Gatorade Player of the Year.

The 5-foot-9, 173-pound athlete from Danville, Kentucky, who has drawn comparisons to former Wildcat star and current National Football League wide receiver Wan’Dale Robinson, recently concluded a high school career where he racked up more than 8,000 total offensive yards. For his career, he rushed for 4,469 yards and 61 touchdowns, caught 151 passes for 2,509 yards and 38 scores and passed for 1,357 yards and 15 touchdowns. He added 13 special teams touchdowns and totaled 165 tackles and eight interceptions.

The Rebels finished the 2024 regular season undefeated before being upset in the state semifinals but were 41-2 with a pair of state championships (2022 and 2023) during Quisenberry’s career. He was a first-team, all-state selection as both a sophomore and junior.

In 2024, he totaled a team-high 49 receptions for 794 yards and also rushed for 882 yards on 79 attempts (11.2 yards per carry). He scored 28 total touchdowns with 13 rushing, 13 receiving, one kickoff return and one punt return. As a free safety on defense, he charted 31 tackles (19 solo) and a team-high three interceptions.

A Kentucky signee has won the Mr. Football honor in three of the last five years.

Does the news of the current QB situation help UK in recruiting playmakers to the offense & mindset of the offense?

Does it move the needle in getting more playmakers on that side of the ball

For what it's worth, and I cannot say with 100% certainty how this QB thing is going to play out, I have been told that Maalik Murphy's visit to Kentucky went very well and there's a feeling that they are in a good position with him. I believe if they want him they will probably be able to get him barring something unforeseen.

The variable is that Calzada is also expected in on a visit and we've heard about him for a while.

Continue to hear WSU's John Mateer mentioned.

As of right now I think Gunnar Hansen is the most likely LT protecting the blindside of whoever they bring in at QB. But I heard it did go well with Murphy.

One in the latest bracketology from ESPN

Calvin Ridley signed with the Titans.

Then again, it might end up being Mason Rudoph's toy, but I highly doubt it.

Two time All MAC. Big fella, welcome aboard. 2 OL early Monday.

Kentucky a Contender

Stats

Started at Oregon. #6 RB nationally on 247 in 2023.

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Pope ain’t playing with the body language highlight clip haha

Gators and Tar Heels just tipped off.

Clemson-South Carolina also playing.

I would much rather have Mendoza at QB than Calzado. And Hunter would be an excellent replacement for Dane Key. The fact they were teammates at Cal and have some chemistry is also a nice draw. Early on we heard these names mentioned quite a bit but I've heard nothing about them lately.

Did we ever seriously pursue them? Did they simply have zero interest in UK? Did they want too much money? It looks like we're just about set to bring in Zach Calzado, who pretty much no UK fan wants. And we don't seem to have any real stand-out options for an outside receiver. Watching this all unfold is so damn frustrating.

Washington State quarterback John Mateer is going into the portal but supposedly with a no contact tag. If you will recall, mentioned that he would be of interest but then said that it had already come and gone as a possibility.
That leaves Maalik Murphy visiting from Duke, and I hear it's today. I've done plenty of digging and had conversations on Murphy, primarily with Conor O'Neill, who covers the Blue Devils here on the Rivals.com network and has a great perspective.

First off, he said that the first school linked to Murphy after he went into the portal was Auburn. Of course, they have taken a commitment from Oklahoma's Jackson Arnold. O'Neill told me that Kentucky is the second school to be linked to Murphy in a major way. There may have been a lot more going on behind the scenes, but this is the second thing that has evolved to talk of a visit.

I asked O'Neill how Murphy's first full season as a starter went and here's what he had to say:

"It was a rollercoaster. It was his first year as a starter. He had the two starts at Texas but the game plan for those games was don't wreck the bus on our way to the CFP. This year was really the first time he had a lot put on his plate at the college level. He had stretches where he looked like one of the best arms in the country. His arm talent is probably the best that I've seen between the guys I've covered at Duke for the last three years or Wake Forest the last eight years. But man, he can be inconsistent and he'd also have stretches of games where Duke's offense sputtered because he was missing some layup type throws. You felt like that got ironed out as the season went on as he got more comfortable.

"In their last game of the regular season they were down 17-3 to a four-win Wake Forest team. Then he got going and they won 23-17. To get into the (details), he threw a game-winning touchdown pass on the last play of the game against Wake Forest. He made the wrong play, it just happened to work out and Duke won the game. Duke had the ball at Wake's 39 with eight seconds left and at least one timeout. They were just looking to get a 5 to 7 yard route and fall down quickly to kick a 50-something yard field goal to win the game. Maalik told us postgame he stayed on the second route too long holding the ball. He made eye contact with Duke's best receiver, Jordan Moore, and he went deep. He got behind the corner and the safety was in the middle of the field, got it at the 10 and crossed the goal line with zeroes left on the clock. It was the wrong play but it wound up winning them their ninth game of the year.

"He's not a runner. He has no desire to be a running quarterback. He wants to sit in the pocket an unleash balls. Probably the biggest area of growth from Game 1 to Game 12 was how much he improved at buying himself time. In the first half of the season if there was even the slightest bit of pressure that got to him you never felt like he could extend the play. He started doing that more in the second half of last year. It's fine if you're a pocket quarterback but Duke wasn't putting five draft picks in front of him as pass blockers. I don't know what Kentucky's offensive line looks like. I started comparing him to Mac Jones about halfway through the year. If you put NFL talent around him and don't ask him to run zone reads or RPOs he might be able to win a national championship. But with the talent Duke had around him it never felt like it was a perfect fit. I think more of a pro-style offense would be better. The numbers won't reflect that he was bad in the pocket but a lot of that has to do with Duke getting the ball out of his hands as quick as possible. The PFF number I always tried to bring up on Mondays and Tuesdays was his time to throw. It was almost always under three seconds. It was very much pop passes and jet sweeps. They did everything they could to minimize the risk of having him take three and five step drops to throw the ball. They took those shots every now and then but the sack number was low and that had a lot to do with play calling."

we have to got to get better defensively.
I want to see old school in your face defensive stops and pressure like the Pitino years.
Surely Pope has some ideas how to fix this. Offensively I am confident we can go far.

I'm so glad we missed out on Achor Achor during this past Summer recruiting period. If I remember correctly I believe a lot of us fans wanted him bad at UK.

Illinois St- Steven Curtis 6’5-255 DE
USC- Sam Greene 6’1 - 255 DE

Both are edge Rushers

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DEC. 17, 2024 


USBWA Tabs Lamont Butler National Player of the Week

Butler scored a career-high 33 points in Kentucky’s win over Louisville


LEXINGTON, Ky. – Lamont Butler’s legendary performance vs. Louisville this past Saturday continues to reverberate throughout the basketball world as the UK point guard was selected as one of five U.S. Basketball Writers Association national Division I players of the week, it was announced on Tuesday.

Returning from a brief two-game absence due to injury, Butler scored a career-high 33 points in the Wildcats’ rivalry victory over Louisville last Saturday, going a perfect 10-of-10 from the field and 6-of-6 from 3-point range.

Butler’s 33 points were the second most ever by a Wildcat against Louisville, and his six-made threes tied for the most by a UK player in the rivalry. He also dished out a game-high six assists in the 93-85 victory inside Rupp Arena at Central Bank Center.

The 10-for-10 shooting performance tied for the third-best in program history. Only Rodney Dent (12 for 12 vs. Morehead State on Dec. 17, 1993) and Kenny Walker (11 of 11 vs. Western Kentucky on March 16, 1986) had better outings. The 6-for-6 performance behind the arc trails only Wenyen Gabriel’s 7-for-7 day in the SEC Tournament on March 10, 2018.

Since 1996-97, Butler is the only Division I player to make all of his shots, score at least 33 points and chart at least six assists. He’s just the second SEC player to finish with 30 or more points and hit all his shot attempts in the last 20 seasons. The 33 points are the most by a Division I player with a perfect field-goal percentage in any game this season.

In addition to the USBWA honors, Butler was also selected as the Co-Player of the Week by the Southeastern Conference. The Moreno Valley, California native is averaging 15.1 points, 4.1 assists and 3.1 rebounds in nine games this season.

USBWA’s five honorees for the week ending Dec. 15 include:

• Lamont Butler, Kentucky
• Tarence Guinyard, UT Martin
• Jamichael Stillwell, Milwaukee
• Taryn Todd, Arkansas State
• Brice Williams, Nebraska

Kentucky returns to action at the CBS Sports Classic inside Madison Square Garden on Saturday. The Cats will take on Ohio State at 5:30 p.m. ET.

Stating that no one pays attention to it once the basketball season starts.

You’d never know that by looking at this board even after a poor football season and a great start for basketball.

Lots of football banter here!

There was a thread about people’s favorite players this year and a few mentioned AW. To me, he has underperformed what I believed he can do with his talents. I’d have to grade him very high on potential but as far as performance this far, he has a pretty low grade. His drive to the middle and throw up a Godawful shot has got to be the worst thing that can happen for this offense and his defense effort is lackadaisical at best.


Again I believe he has a lot of potential maybe even NBA potential but his play thus far is low grade. Can you guys tell me why your so
high on him right now based on his performance? What am I missing?

Get back in here, idiots. Idk why they let us out of our cage. That's messed up. Let's just keep it all together for The Cats and get focused on our tournament run. Amen.

If you love UK - make your decision so we can move on.

I think he'll see this since he's all about social media.
😉

Insanely bad and bizarre time for what many years would probably be our biggest SEC home game of the year. But, what an opportunity.

UF has a lot of exactly what gives us problems. Really tough matchup, one of like 15 in SEC play.

If we win that, we should be a solid 1 seed heading into mid-January.

Rupp HAS to be ready and I hope UK gets creative and does some cool things to make sure the crowd will be jacked and in their seats early. Let's just tailgate the game downtown. Idk. 10am pep rally, whiteout, throwback uni's, pom poms. Something. Whatever it takes we gotta give them energy that day (morning).

I’m 48. I’ll have 4-5 beers and 2 tokes and I’m relaxing and enjoying good music, maybe a fire, friends or even by myself, and thats the perfect buzz and a good time for this old guy. What about y’all?

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Wow. Came at the best time of the season honestly