With Florida winning streak gone, has Kentucky football fallen back into SEC basement?

The list of reasons to be optimistic about Kentucky football continued to shrink Saturday as Florida snapped its three-game losing streak to the Wildcats with a 48-20 win in Gainesville.

The loss dropped UK to 3-4 on the season and 1-4 in SEC play.

Here is a look at what the defeat means for the rest of UK’s season.

Another blow to UK’s standing in new-look SEC

As the frustrating performances piled up in the last three years (see multiple losses to South Carolina and Vanderbilt), Kentucky and Mark Stoops could at least point to the three-game winning streak over Florida as proof the Wildcats were still relevant in the SEC.

That streak is now gone. To be sure, winning at The Swamp can never be considered a sure thing, regardless of how much heat is currently on Florida coach Billy Napier, but it still adds to the concern that Kentucky is falling back to its traditional spot in the SEC basement.

Kentucky and Florida are no longer guaranteed to play every season as the SEC works to finalize a schedule format following the additions of Texas and Oklahoma to the league and move away from divisions, but the schedule is likely to only grow more difficult regardless of whether Florida is on it each season. Even if the Wildcats could rely on having the former SEC East schedule, UK has now lost its most recent game against each of its former division rivals.

In a 16-team SEC, how many programs can reliably be ranked behind Kentucky right now?

Mississippi State is clearly the worst team in the league this season. Next week’s opponent Auburn is still looking for its first league win this season but has tradition and resources that suggest it will not remain at the bottom of the league for long.

South Carolina and Vanderbilt are far from powerhouses, but already have head-to-head wins over Kentucky this season. Now Florida has staked a claim to be ranked ahead of Kentucky as well.

The win at Ole Miss this season shows Kentucky is not without talent. Maybe Stoops and company right the ship next week against Auburn then shock the league again with an upset at Tennessee or Texas to salvage something from 2024.

But after Saturday, the fears that Kentucky is an SEC also-ran again are hard to dispute.

Bowl hopes take a major blow

A loss in Gainesville does not end Kentucky’s hopes of playing in a bowl for the ninth consecutive season, but it reduces the margin of error to keep that streak alive to almost nothing.

Kentucky needs three more wins to reach bowl eligibility. With the annual FCS game against Murray State still to come, UK probably needs two wins from home games against Auburn and Louisville and road trips to Tennessee and Texas.

Auburn, next week’s opponent, is 0-4 in SEC play, but UK is just 2-10 in its last 12 SEC home games. The September win at Ole Miss means Kentucky’s chances at No. 11 Tennessee and No. 1 Texas cannot be dismissed, but the Wildcats will probably be substantial underdogs in both games. UK has won five straight in the rivalry series against Louisville, but Jeff Brohm’s Cardinals spent most of the first half in the top 25 before losing three of their last four games.

The reality is even if UK beats Auburn, Murray State and Louisville, a six-win season is still unlikely to appease fans concerned about the direction of the program, but it would at least avoid the worst-case scenario. It is worth noting that with the SEC adding two new teams this season but no new bowl partners, at least one (and maybe more) six-to-seven-win SEC teams will likely fall out of the league’s “Pool of Six” bowls to the Birmingham or Gasparilla Bowl. There are even scenarios where there are enough bowl eligible SEC teams for one to fall to a bowl contracted to another league without enough eligible teams to fill all its spots.

If Vanderbilt and South Carolina, two teams that have already beaten Kentucky, reach bowl eligibility, a six-win UK team would be the most likely option to fall to one of those games. The Athletic and Action Network both slotted UK in the Birmingham Bowl in their midseason bowl projections last week.

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