Jason MarcumMon, December 1, 2025 at 2:58 AM UTC·2 min readWe finally have a decision on Kentucky football head coach Mark Stoops.
According to Jeff Drummond of Cats Illustrated, Stoops and Kentucky have agreed to part ways.
About 30 minutes after that report came out, ESPN’s Pete Thamel is now reporting Kentucky is expected to fire Stoops on Monday.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementIt’s unclear how much of Stoops’ reported buyout of $38 million will be paid out and what the structure of that is. His contract states that the full buyout is to be paid within 60 days if terminated by the university. But because this is a mutual parting, that structure and/or payout amount will likely be changed.
Stoops is coming off a second straight losing season after going 4-8 last season, which also included a blowout loss to in-state rival Louisville, that one being a 41-14 beatdown in Lexington last November.
This time, it was a 41-0 shellacking at Louisville in a game Kentucky was actually favored by 1.5 points by kickoff after the Cardinals ruled many key starters out due to injury. That came after Kentucky was crushed 45-17 the previous week at Vanderbilt and trailed 45-3 in the fourth quarter.
Kentucky is also now 23-27 combined over the last four seasons, and that’s after having 10 wins vacated from the 10-3 2021 season due to players being paid for work that was not done at UK’s hospital. That means Kentucky officially has 23 wins and 30 losses over the last five seasons.
AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementAll of this paved the way for another serious push for change at head coach,
We will have more on this story shortly. And be sure to check out Drummond’s full report (it’s well worth the subscription to KSR and Cats Illustrated).
___________________________________________________________
You want more A Sea Of Blue coverage? Then add us to your “Preferred Sources” on Google to get all the latest Kentucky Wildcats news and views. And be sure to check out our friends at Bleav in Kentucky for everything you need to know about the Cats packed into weekly podcasts. And as always, Go CATS!
AdvertisementAdvertisement
