Georgia's historic 65-7 blowout victory against TCU in last night's national championship was a sobering reminder that in the world of college football haves and have nots, the inner circle is a lot smaller than almost anyone would like to accept.

Maybe I have a tendency to make broad stroke judgements based on experience, but nothing suggests to me that the sport's inner circle is going to be widening any time soon.

It's possible for a program to stretch and get to a championship level, or a near championship level, under the right conditions. TCU was good enough to beat Michigan. Oregon's rise in modern times has brought the Ducks close to a championship. Clemson was more known for Clemsoning than winning titles before Dabo Swinney got there.

But right now, the sport is big enough for championships to cycle through only a small handful of coaches at a small handful of programs. Most of those national championship-capable programs are in the SEC. There may be some years when the Big Ten can rival the SEC in terms of top to bottom respectability, but the fact that the SEC has upwards of six or seven programs that you could imagine stretching for title contention any given year makes it very different than the Big Ten, from which only Ohio State appears capable of elevating to that level any given year.

Kentucky has had the bad fortune of playing an SEC schedule but the good fortune of competing in the East. That's not good fortune going forward, with Georgia the clear top Dawgs in the sport and Tennessee coming off an 11-win season punctuated in grand style against Clemson in a New Years Six bowl.

The Wildcats take on Georgia, Alabama, and Tennessee next season. College football pundits across the country will immediately assume that the Wildcats will be 0-3 in those games. Throw in a game on the road against SEC West - the kind of game that has not gone well for Mark Stoops - and a lot of folks will probably rightfully wonder about the margin for error next season.

I'm actually of the mind that it's not impossible that Kentucky could make things interesting against Alabama and/or Tennessee in Lexington. If you doubt that, just look at Alabama's last two years worth of SEC results. It's not uncommon for even average teams to have a punchers chance later in the game. Arkansas finished the season 6-6 and had the Tide on the ropes in the second half in Fayetteville earlier this season, and one has to assume that Kentucky will at least be competitive against the Vols at home, even if the 'Cats will be the underdog.

The bottom line is that next year's Kentucky schedule is very difficult. I'm not going to be able to talk myself or many of you into calling the Wildcats a "darkhorse" in an East with those two programs, and Georgia in particular right now. Last night's memory is just too fresh, and a whole lifetime of college football viewing doesn't change that first assessment.

But next year is really big for Kentucky football and for Mark Stoops.

There's no talk of the hot seat, nor should there be. In spite of a disappointing season, Stoops' seat should be very cool.

I'm going to judge next season based on how the Wildcats fare in one particular area: Can Mark Stoops begin to transition to more of an attacking style on offense?

In order for Kentucky to break through to another level, that has to happen.

We can't forget about what a big achievement it has been for Stoops and Company to build what they've got going. Kentucky has quietly evolved into one of the more consistently solid football programs at the Power Five level, and even in the East, in the SEC that's a big deal. Even in a year when the offensive line struggled as much as just about any other out there, the Wildcats managed seven wins and the right side of the W/L ledger.

But in the big picture, Kentucky has to transition, offensively, to a team that can put a defense on its heels and keep it there.

That doesn't mean Stoops has to get away from his preference for playing conservative with a comfortable lead, but it means he needs to bring the offense to a point where it's dangerous enough and explosive enough to make really good teams sweat a little more.

Don't take that as a knock, because Stoops has defeated some really good teams already. He beat top-10 Louisville, Penn State, an Iowa team that won its division, a stout Mississippi State squad in 2018, and a New Years Six bowl participant at Florida, in the Swamp no less.

Kentucky's formula of power football and ball control gave way a little bit this year as personnel realities changed what the Cats were able to do to opponents. Next year there is no Chris Rodriguez and the line will still be a question going into the year. There will not be the same physical identity in the run game that we've grown accustomed to seeing from a program that has been spoiled by seven or eight years of excellent running back play, and bruising success at that.

Next year it's the Devin Leary, Barion Brown, Dane Key, and Tayvion Robinson show on offense. Assuming Liam Coen returns as the offensive coordinator, and it seems like it's just a matter of time until that announcement, the program will have to win games differently on offense.

More passing. More downfield passing. More giving receivers a chance to make the contested 50-50 plays that come from more all or nothing, full speed ahead offense.

Kentucky doesn't need to be as wide open as TCU or Tennessee. Coaches can win in very different ways.

But this needs to be the year that we start to talk about the evolution of Stoops' program on the offensive side of the ball.

There will be plenty of opportunities for marquee, nation-shocking wins next year. One of those might be worth a whole bunch of wins against middling opponents as far as the nation and perception is concerned. The Louisville game is going to be very important because of perception with Jeff Brohm coming in. Lose to Vanderbilt and/or Missouri for a second straight year against that schedule and there will be some gripes.

But in the big picture, I'm less interested in whether Kentucky finishes 6-6 or 7-5 or 8-4 and more interested in what the offense looks like moving forward.

Kentucky has a defense that can hold a two-time national champ to 16 points. That's one year removed from the Cats playing Georgia as tough as almost any other team, as they did in Athens in 2021. And it seems like as long as Brad White is coordinating the defense, the personnel is already good enough to continue at pretty much the same pace on that side of the ball. That's not where the significant tweaks are going to be.

A big part of Nick Saban evolving to continue to compete for championships in recent years has been opening up the offense. Georgia is still more power, but the ability to attack, press the ball down the field, and stretch a defense with big play ability that hits you all game long is an essential ingredient to Mark Stoops getting Kentucky to another level. He's broke through several plateaus before and this is just the next.