Kentucky football falls to Auburn, 24-10

LEXINGTON, Ky. — A promising start quickly turned sour for the Kentucky football team Saturday night.

After going up 10-0 over the 2-5 Auburn Tigers, Kentucky was outscored 24-0 the remainder of the night, as the visitors earned a 24-10 win inside Kroger Field. With the loss, Kentucky's record falls to 3-5 overall and 1-4 in conference games. The Wildcats will not earn an SEC win at home this season.

Meanwhile, Auburn earns its first conference win of the year, snapping a four-game skid and prolonging Kentucky's now three-game losing streak.

Brock Vandagriff finished his night 9-17 for 120 yards and one interception in the air, while Gavin Wimsatt was used primarily in the run game - 10 carries for a net positive of 16 yards while adding 34 yards (3-10) and one interception in the pass game.

Dane Key led the attack in the air with four completions for 87 yards, while Jason Patterson paced the ground game with 38 yards on six carries. Both Demie Sumo-Karngbaye and Chip Trayanum were unavailable.

It was Auburn's running back, though, who stole the show. Senior Jarquez Hunter was unstoppable, finishing with 278 yards. As a team, the Tigers recorded 498 yards of total offense, compared to UK's 224.

Kentucky came out firing, and the Wildcats earned three points on their first drive of the night, courtesy of midseason All-American kicker, Alex Raynor. UK's defense quickly got in on the action, forcing a three-and-out on Auburn's first offensive possession of the night.

When the Wildcats got the ball back, the offense was churning. Key came down with an unreal grab for a gain of 34 yards, followed by a Patterson rush for 23 more. The freshman running back skirted out of bounds at the three-yard line, with fellow-freshman Jamarion Wilcox ready to punch in those three remaining yards, three plays later.

Raynor's point-after attempt was good, and UK's lead ballooned to 10-0.

Junior cornerback JQ Hardaway quickly put the ball back in the offense's hands, thanks to his second interception of the year.

The Cats weren't able to capitalize, and UK was forced to punt. The defense kept battling, but the Tigers found their rhythm early in the second quarter, thanks in part to a momentum-shifting penalty on freshman Terhyon Nichols. Auburn was facing a 3rd-and-2 when Nichols was called for pass interference, sending the Tigers to UK's 30-yard line with a fresh set of downs. Two rushes for double-digit yards followed by a pass to the right-hand side of the end zone put six points on the board for the visitors.

It took just five plays and 2:32 of game clock for Auburn to drive 53 yards into the end zone. The extra point was good, and the Tigers had cut it to three. UK led, 10-7 with 10:56 left in the first half.

Vandagriff threw an interception, intended for Brown, on UK's next offensive possession, giving the Tigers the opportunity to put more points on the board in a hurry. Kentucky's defense gave up a handful of chunk plays, allowing Auburn to get within the red zone, until a second-down sack by Keeshawn Silver and a third-down tackle courtesy of Jordan Lovett and JJ Weaver finally slowed Auburn quarterback, Payton Thorne. The Tigers settled for a field goal but still tied the game, 10-all, with just under four minutes left in the half.

Auburn seemed destined to take advantage of every second, marching toward more points as time dwindled. The scene was all but set: third and five, ball on the 14-yard line, 15 seconds to play. Auburn had no timeouts remaining, but everything else seemed to be on their side.

Head Coach Hugh Freeze elected to take another shot at the end zone, but the gamble didn't pay off for the Tigers.

Enter: JJ Weaver.

Kentucky's super-senior linebacker came down with an enormous sack to bring Thorne down for a loss of seven yards. With time ticking, Auburn's offense wasn't able to sub with the team's special teams unit in enough time to get the field-goal attempt off, and time expired without a kick.

The Cats and the Tigers were tied, 10-10, at the half.

Not for long. Auburn got the ball back to start the second half, and the visiting offense wasted no time getting the run game going, again. Hunter toted the rock on nine of the 14 plays it took the Tigers to get back in the end zone, including the 1-yard touchdown. Auburn took the lead, 17-10.

The Wildcats found no such go-to guy. Kentucky's offense finished the third quarter with seven snaps, six yards and zero additional points.

The UK coaching staff elected to stay with Wimsatt for the remainder of the game. The quarterback threw a demoralizing interception from the 2-yard line with 4:39 remaining in the fourth quarter, which all-but ended the game. The Wildcats had possession for 24:18, compared to Auburn's 35:42.

Kentucky will travel to Knoxville next Saturday for a night game against No. 7 Tennessee. The Volunteers are on a bye week today, and will enter the UK-UT game 6-1 after back-to-back wins over Florida and Alabama.