Should we keep or drop the U of L Game with the 9 Game SEC Meat-grinder?
- Thread starter The-Hack
- Start date
Don't know. Recently it's been pretty much a guaranteed win. If that changes, drop them. With 9 conference games we need a cupcake.
I say keep them. I don`t want to hear we`re afraid of them and we need an in state rivalry. With the additions coming soon, I can see a lot of good teams going 6-6 or 7-5. Even top 25 teams could be 8-4.
Drop them. The game literally means the world to them and is their best ticket to relevance. We should stop throwing them that life preserver and let them sink.
Schedule another annual home game to increase revenue
Schedule another annual home game to increase revenue
Why play a rivalry game when you can play a MAC school. Fun!
Umm, we’re still Kentucky, not Bama or Georgia, not even Tennessee, LSU, or Auburn. No power 5 school gets relevance from beating us. Y’all sound like you’re scared of UL. This is the only fanbase that runs from rivalries.
Our annual home schedule will be far more varied and difficult beginning, 2024.
We’ll see A & M, Bama, Auburn , Georgia, LSU, Florida, Texas, and Oklahoma, each, at least once every four years at Kroger Field and each at least once on the Road each four years.
And we will play three annual opponents home-and-home from the SEC, every year.
Given that quality of schedule, who would give a damn if we squeeze three MAC schools into the cracks between the SEC giants?
You must not know any UL fans or you are one
As far as Kentucky football's most important goals are concerned, it doesn't matter whether we play UL or not. Becoming a consistent top 10 team has nothing at all to do with UL. Building up our football program to a level of competing with Georgia does not have one freaking thing to do with UL.
As far as the SEC's current policy is concerned, we have to play one ACC team a year. That could change with the stroke of a pen and probably will.
We play UL because we have to play one ACC team a year, and because current state politics make it easier to play the game than to avoid it. Once the SEC changes its scheduling rules to accommodate Texas and Oklahoma, all of this may change. A subgroup, probably a minority, in our fan base still believes this game has national importance. Nobody in the national football industry believes that. The major networks don't even want to carry it. Playing the series just gives Jeff Brohm the chance for an occasional upset, which can only hurt our recruiting but cannot help it. I don't know if the series will continue or not, but it probably should not.
As far as the SEC's current policy is concerned, we have to play one ACC team a year. That could change with the stroke of a pen and probably will.
We play UL because we have to play one ACC team a year, and because current state politics make it easier to play the game than to avoid it. Once the SEC changes its scheduling rules to accommodate Texas and Oklahoma, all of this may change. A subgroup, probably a minority, in our fan base still believes this game has national importance. Nobody in the national football industry believes that. The major networks don't even want to carry it. Playing the series just gives Jeff Brohm the chance for an occasional upset, which can only hurt our recruiting but cannot help it. I don't know if the series will continue or not, but it probably should not.
While UK needs the easy win, the only way I'd continue to play the game is by playing 3 of 4 years in Lexington. UK needs the home games.
UL will never agree to that. They believe we are equals, and their false pride will never allow that kind of a concession. If the idea was introduced in a negotiation, they would leak it and try to use it as bulletin board material.
Besides, it just isn't worth it. UK gets nothing out of playing UL except for an opportunity to lower ourselves to their level.
Drop we should not play mid majors.
The day U of L lines up a schedule of Texas, Texas A & M, Oklahoma, Bama, Auburn, Florida, Tennessee and LSU, is the day I will give a damn what they or anyone else thinks about Kentucky’s scheduling priorities in the new world we are in.
If Kentucky put together a 10-2 season, going 7-2 against the SEC and 3-0 against the MAC, do we end up in the Top 12?
Hell, yes we do!!!
We might squeeze into the Top 12 at 9-3, given that in any season those three losses could be to teams in the Top Six.
How would beating U of L (with even a slightly more likely loss than to a MAC squad) help us?
It wouldn’t.
And given that it is home-and-home, it will literally cost us money every time we play them on the road, as opposed to seating 80 percent of Kroger Field for a MAC or other G5 program.
The time to act solely in the interests of UK is at hand.
We would be fools to pass up this opportunity.
A few Bowl games will survive the playoffs. Kentucky versus Louisville will be a dream come true for some bowls post 2024, so long as we don’t play them in the regular season.
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gotta keep em. sports are good in large part because of rivalries, tradition, and history. trying to game out more wins makes for an emptier experience. winning just one more game a year won't make up the difference.
i hated it when cocky uofl fans were floating this type of thinking a decade ago, and i hate it now too (not saying op is cocky uk fan to be clear).
i hated it when cocky uofl fans were floating this type of thinking a decade ago, and i hate it now too (not saying op is cocky uk fan to be clear).
I'm fine with it either way. Playing another MAC team isn't gonna save us in the grand scheme of the season and isn't going to help UK win the SEC. That said, I also agree the game means more to UL than UK overall.
If we drop them, how many years before the state legislature mandates we have to schedule them like basketball?
The Louisville political folks would go for it. I doubt they could muster a state-wide legislative majority on the issue.
There have been multiple fights/brushups for every U of L game.
Because it is a rivalry, injuries are always a concern. Also, their playing above their heads as result of it being a rivalry is a concern: just ask Card fans how handy their third loss was in 2016, costing them their only shot at a NYD6 bowl (and Top 12 ranking) since playoffs began in 2014.
Then ask Card fans whether Micheal Bush’s knee injury in 2006 would have been less likely against an FCS or G5 player than against 10 year pro, Wesley Woodyard.
Playing Louisville will cost us money, and no one yet has come up with a positive for UK . . . lest “what are they going to say,” counts.
And no one gives a sh!t what they say.
Frankly, at this point, choosing to retain U of L on our schedule would border a violation of the fiduciary duties owed the school by its professionals.
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We played a power 5 school OOC not named Louisville or Indiana 33 years ago.
We really get nothing by beating them. If we win, we are in the SEC so it's expected. If we lose, we lost to a second tier ACC school. It's not really a benefit to us to play them
I'd present it as "take it or leave it" then it's on them. It's time UK does something for themselves.
Here is another angle. Before the Governor and Legislature forced UK to play ,my young son and I were UL fans as well going to the fairgrounds stadium and cheering on the big O Otis Wilson.
However once we were forced to play them we have been opposed to anything UL.
I agree with posters above that we should do what is in UK ‘s interest and that is to play 3 MAC teams . Go 5/4 in SEC and add three games we are 8/4. Can argue for a good bowl.
However once we were forced to play them we have been opposed to anything UL.
I agree with posters above that we should do what is in UK ‘s interest and that is to play 3 MAC teams . Go 5/4 in SEC and add three games we are 8/4. Can argue for a good bowl.
I’d drop them with the expansion coming up in ‘24. With Sankey pushing a single division format, we can say goodbye to the Vandy, Mizzou, and SC games every year and those are ones we’ve done well with. We’d also lose Miss St in an annual basis, basically our schedule overall is going to get a lot tougher but I’d much rather see a game in Austin or Norman vs a storied program than Louisville.
I’ve gotten something out of every time we’ve beat UL. What do we get from beating MAC schools? Just say you’re scared to lose to little brother.
Yes.
And really, we need not panick.
Oklahoma and Texas (and Texas A & M and Auburn and LSU and Arkansas) have shown themselves hardly to be worldbeaters the last few seasons.
Our entry into the new world might just perfectly coincide with our peak of former 4 and 5 Star players on our team, obviously depending on the 2024 signing Class, and how many are left from our big haul in 2021.
How ever you cut it, this world is ruled by money, and money is power. An additional home game every-other year means at least two-three million of ticket sales, parking licenses and concessions (and beersales??).
The new SEC will be a gun fight, and we don’t need a switchblade to win.
98 percent of the college football world could give-a-sh!t who our little brother is, but most know our traditional slot in the SEC. Of the 2 percent who give-a-sh!t, half know the crimes upon which their limited successes were built, and hold them in slightly in less contempt than they do Penn State.
All advantages, financial and otherwise, break for UK to drop this series.
Could it hurt recruiting?
Show recruits (at least) bi-annual trips to Austin, College Station, Tuscaloosa, Baton Rouge, Gainesville, Knoxville, Athens and Auburn, and they will forget who Louisville is, quickly.
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I think the series has done a lot to elevate both programs and raise interest in football in general in the state. However IMO to make it to the playoffs you need three cupcakes and a bye week. So if we have to play 9 SEC opponents we just don't have room for UofL on the schedule anymore.
No one except people living near the I-64 corridor can seriously believe anymore that Kentucky-Louisville is actually a "rivalry" in any realistic sense. The networks obviously do not think it is. Jeff Brohm can possibly lift Louisville out of the ACC basement, but he cannot make a real "rivalry" out of Kentucky-Louisville. The best he can do is maybe pull off an unexpected upset once in a while in years when Kentucky has too many injuries late in the season. When it comes to the primary goals of Kentucky's football program, playing Louisville cannot do anything for Kentucky.
There is a reason Stoops has already insinuated that dropping UL would be best for the program. Stoops obviously will always do what is best for the program. Why doesn't some fans not care about what is best for the program?
Which is why Jurich lost his job and his career.
Not in this century, nor in the next one.
I'd prefer it be dropped in favor of a mandated P5 game so we can rotate some fresh opponents on to our schedule. Go get West Virginia Illinois Indiana etc. Schedule some regional games. Louisville is trash.
because it is a rivalry game i voted to keep it
in reality UK is ul's measuring stick
they consider progress not getting blown out by UK
in reality UK is ul's measuring stick
they consider progress not getting blown out by UK
Then take away their stick, and let them tussle with Boston College, UVA, Georgia Tech, Wake Forest and the rest of the P5 imitators.
If Clemson, Florida State or Miami ever look promising, again, long-term, two of them, at least, would jump at a shot to join the SEC.
We are entering a new world, a world of massive financial benefits for UK.
We must take advantage of our new, even more dominant position re: U of L and the rest of the diminished P5.
I like the idea of playing other P5 teams like West Virginia, IU, Illinois, maybe K-State or some PAC 12 folks.
But they should come to our stadium, period.
Why?
Because we say so!!
Who else in the SEC would do a home-and-home with any of them?
Or maybe do one game against, say Cal in Lexington, and the next one in Atlanta, with a split gate.
However it works out, we’d be fools not to leverage our clout in the new SEC.
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1. UK will be playing 9 games with probably TN, Vandy and USC/Mizzou as 3 permanent....then 6 more games with possibilities of OK, UGA, Bama, LSU, Florida, Texas AM, Texas, Auburn, etc... being part of them.
2. UL will play Clemson, FSu, Wake, NC St, Syracuse, and Boston College as permanet....and rotate the other side of UNC, Duke, Pitt, Ga Tech, Miami, Va Tech and Virginia......
Can you not see the complete disparity of their slate vs. UKs? Why help them then our road gets tougher and with the playoff expanding....why even play a losable 3 non conference game? Please tell me the logic.
2. UL will play Clemson, FSu, Wake, NC St, Syracuse, and Boston College as permanet....and rotate the other side of UNC, Duke, Pitt, Ga Tech, Miami, Va Tech and Virginia......
Can you not see the complete disparity of their slate vs. UKs? Why help them then our road gets tougher and with the playoff expanding....why even play a losable 3 non conference game? Please tell me the logic.
Actually, this has changed, and I do not think they play Clemson next year.
I’ll check and edit!
[They play Norte Dame at home, Georgia Tech in a Kickoff classic, but no Clemson, or FSU. Their toughest games look to be ND, Miami, NC State, Pitt, Virginia Tech, and . . . . I. U., out of conference.
Hell, we’ll be their second toughest opponent for the season, assuming Nortre Dame is worth a damn.].
Other opponents: Duke, Murray State, Boston College, UVA.
They’ll have a decent shot at 8 wins next year, and could be ranked, as they were last season for our game.
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There is none, short of a grade-school-ish concern about “what they will say about us.”
We will soon be facing a schedule that will annually include somewhere between five to eight of the Top 20 programs in college football history, and in the neighborhood of the Top six, seven, or eight of the Top 25 ranked in the nation.
Maybe we should throw caution to the wind, and schedule Clemson, Ohio State and Michigan to toughen our OOC schedule!! [go 8-4 and make the playoffs?!?!].
And maybe not.
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LOL at help them. How on Earth did beating them 6 bazillion to 12 over the last 4 years help them. Y’all have John Calipari injected into you where you don’t believe in tradition rivalries and competition.
Next y’all are gonna be screaming to join the AAC because it’s easier to win there.
This is a limited view of history that assumes who is on top now stays that way forever. I don’t live in Jefferson county (several hours away actually), I just remember my history. That pendulum is always swinging.
Just ask Alabama fans before Saban. Clemson fans before Dabo. Georgia fans before Kirby. USC fans since Carrel. The only permanence is impermanence
But my larger point: playing a local rival is good for the culture in ways the marginal utility of beating an extra MAC team for one extra win could ever come close. What a hollow, empty experience to get to 7-9 wins that way. I actually think posters have it the opposite: the 2013 version of Kentucky football is when to drop P5 opponent for the MAC but not now when the program is run well.
(I also think this is a moot debate. ESPN won’t want to lose its SEC vs ACC showcase.)
(I wonder if there’s talk like this btwn other SEC vs ACC teams too. And if the sides have flipped as one starts to dominate for its own run on top. )
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