The temperature of Mark Stoops‘ seat has been toasty. Criticism for the Kentucky head coach has not been hard to find, and it was amplified after the Wildcats dropped consecutive SEC games at Kroger Field.

Players and coaches will say they don’t pay attention to the noise, but let’s be real. They’re human. It’s unavoidable. As Big Blue Nation debated on Stoops’ future at Kentucky, his players rallied behind him.

“We hate it. We’re kind of taking it on our shoulders and putting it on ourselves,” Kentucky quarterback Cutter Boley said after the game.

Even though Stoops may have lost some fans in recent weeks, he never lost the locker room. Win or loss, they showed up to work because that’s the approaches every single day.

“He’s a players’ coach. All the guys in here love him. All the guys want to fight for him, want to win for him, everything like that. We have a really good thing going in the locker room. You can see our heartbeat that we had tonight,” said Boley.

“Everybody loves Coach Stoops, what he does, and what he stands for, and how he addresses the team in every situation, loss, win, no matter what it is. He’s always the same guy. Loss, win, whatever it is. He’s always the same guy in the locker room. He’s always the same guy talking to us on Mondays, no matter the outcome. And I think every guy respects that and really wants to play for him.”

That feeling has manifested in exceptional play from this Kentucky football team, especially at quarterback. Over Boley’s last three starts at Kroger Field, the redshirt freshman has completed 75-97 (77.3%) passes for 756 yards (252 per game) and seven touchdowns. His play has elevated his teammates, giving Kentucky a shocking amount of late-season momentum.

For years, Kentucky relied on transfer portal players to start under center. For the first time in a long time, the Wildcats have a proficient passer they recruited from the high school ranks. Stoops is proud to see Boley develop into the player they believed he could become.

“I’ve believed in Cutter for a long time, for many years, three, four years. I’m really proud of him, the growth that he’s making, and the improvement that he’s making each and every week,” said Stoops. “It gives everybody some hope.”

Hope. That was hard to find around this Kentucky football team, but inside the locker room, it never wavered. That hope turned into unshakable confidence in a dominant victory over Florida.

“To be honest, this whole week, this whole day, we came with juice,” Boely said. “Everybody was excited, and everybody was ready to play. We had felt, not that we had won this game before we came out here, but we were so confident. We had a heartbeat tonight.”