The CI staff offers its first impressions from Kentucky's 14-3 loss to No. 5 Georgia on Saturday afternoon at Kroger Field.
JUSTIN ROWLAND:
I hate to be too harsh after Kentucky lost to Georgia 14-3. This is a supremely talented opponent and a truly elite defense that Kentucky faced. We all knew that UGA was about the worst possible matchup for Kentucky based on how UK wants to play and its program strengths and weaknesses. But this was a pretty brutal watch. The defense did some admirable things, but UGA never needed to put its foot on the gas. It could keep things totally vanilla because they were never really tested apart from that long drive in the second quarter. The offense is completely broken. Unless you cannot stop the run even when you stack the box, the offense will not keep a defensive coordinator up at night. They're going to have to make some changes in the long run because there's no excuse for the offense to be this bad.
JEFF DRUMMOND:
Kentucky played with a lot more passion today than it showed last week at Missouri, but it wasn't enough to overcome Georgia's talent edge, even on a bad day for the Bulldogs. Joey Gatewood's first start brought some buzz to Big Blue Nation, but once again the Wildcats failed to present any kind of downfield passing attack. Compounding matters, he also coughed up a fumble on a quarterback keeper, the same issue that had plagued previous starter Terry Wilson. Chris Rodriguez ran exceptionally hard against a really tough UGA defense, and I thought the O-Line played pretty well, but until the Cats find a way to come out of the Stone Age offensively, there's a ceiling on what they can accomplish this season.