That ground game figures to be crucial for the Cats this weekend as they go on the road for the first time this season, visiting Southeastern Conference rival South Carolina in Columbia Saturday night (7:45 p.m. ET, SEC Network).
Following Tuesday’s practice, UK offensive coordinator Bush Hamdan met the media and he stressed the importance of being able to run the ball in every game.
“I think, in this conference, (you know) how important that is,” Hamdan said. “You’ve got to run the football to win. I think that’s extremely important. You’ve got to control the clock and provide long drives to keep the defense off the field. I think we’re seeing that conference-wide, just how important that is. You’ve got to run the rock and I think we’ve done that.”
Hamdan watched the tape of South Carolina’s loss to Missouri last Saturday and he saw how the Tigers were able to be effective running against the Gamecocks.
“Missouri did a lot of really good things,” Hamdan said. “Their commitment to the run game is what propelled that victory.”
UK starting quarterback Cutter Boley believes the Cats have a good plan for Saturday’s game.
“Every quarterback loves to go downfield but what’s going to be big for us in this game is just getting completions and moving the ball, staying in the flow,” Boley said. “I think over the last two weeks, we’ve gotten really comfortable with our plan.”
Hamdan knows that the Cats need to have a narrow focus on Saturday.
“Every possession is going to be important,” he said. “Playing clean football, eliminating negatives, that’s going to be the focus.”
Hamdan has confidence in Boley because of the experience he has already gained.
“I think Cutter has experienced it, which has been good from the standpoint of already having a couple of starts under his belt,” Hamdan said. “Certainly this bye week has helped. He’s going to have to go in there and just play like he plays.”
South Carolina’s defense is solid, especially edge rushers Dylan Stewart and Bryan Thomas. Hamdan knows that it will be important to identify those two players on every play.
“We’ve got to do a great job of not putting our edge guys in bad spots,” Hamdan said. “There’s a certain level of physicality we’ve got to play with. We’ve got to know where those guys are on the field and try to stay out of long passing situations as much as possible.”
Boley echoed his coordinator’s thoughts.
“They’ve got a lot of good dudes all over the field,” Boley said. “They’ve got a lot of athletes but those two edge defenders are really good players. They’ve got a lot of good dudes in the back, too.”
Running the ball, sticking to the game plan and minimizing mistakes will all be key for the Cats on Saturday.