A Far Cry From '84
Back in October of 2004, the University of Kentucky honored it's 1984 football squad during the game against Ohio University. That 1984 unit was a Wildcat football team that went 9-3, including a Hall of Fame Bowl victory against a ranked Wisconsin team. That UK roster would eventually produce 13 NFL draft picks over the next few years. One of those draft picks , my good friend Greg Kunkel, offered me a pair of tickets to the game. I gladly took the tickets and made the trip to Lexington with my wife, excited to see our Wildcats get a fairly easy victory. Then the game started.
A Performance To Forget
I've been to many UK games for both football and basketball. Occasionally, you will witness one of those unforgettable performances, and you can feel it while it is happening. This was not one of those. To the best of my recollection, this was one of those games where it felt like we came out not ready and maybe not respecting the opponent. There was a late Kentucky score to bring them within 2 touchdowns but the outcome had long been decided.
Philosophy From Young M.C.
The lyric from Bust A Move tells us that "every dark tunnel has a light of hope." If you were still hanging in Commonweath Stadium that night , you saw some flashes of things to come late in the game. With the first unit unable to get anything moving, Coach Brooks decided to let some of his young talent get some snaps. It was my first glimpse of names like Woodson, Tamme, and Little and it gave me something positive to talk about on the drive home.
Hooked On Brooks
That drive home is where we decided it was time to get our UK Football season tickets. Even though that team would go on to lose six of the last seven, you could see the young talent rising up. That turned out to be the foundation for a run of bowl teams that produced some of my favorite UK sports memories. Despite the slight dip in the on the field product since 2007 , I still maintain that a football gameday experience at UK is better than a basketball gameday 85 percent of the time. If you were in the stadium for the Louisville or LSU game in 2007, you probably agree. There are occasional replays of those games but it is hard to recapture the moments as they occurred. I did find a full game replay of the 2006 Music City Bowl, which I didn't know existed , on Amazon. You can find it here 2006 University of Kentucky Music City Bowl,
