Connect with us

Kentucky

Kentucky opens against Southern Miss, seeking fourth series victory in five meetings

Published

on

Kentucky opens against Southern Miss, seeking fourth series victory in five meetings


Southern Miss at Kentucky, Saturday, 7:45 p.m. ET (SEC)

BetMGM College Football Odds: Kentucky by 28.

Series record: Kentucky leads 3-1.

WHAT’S AT STAKE?

Southern Miss looks to bounce back from its second 3-9 finish in three seasons. The Golden Eagles also aim to break an eight-game skid against SEC teams, with its most recent win coming at Kentucky in 2016. The host Wildcats seek a strong start before a two-game conference stretch that includes No. 1 Georgia on Sept. 14.

Advertisement

KEY MATCHUP

Kentucky ranked 98th in FBS offense last season (339.5 yards per game) and looks to move up in many categories under new coordinator Bush Hamdan, who led a top-30 unit at Boise State in 2023. The Wildcats also break in a new quarterback in Georgia transfer Brock Vandagriff, who backed up Stetson Bennett and Carson Beck the past three seasons. Southern Miss’ defense looks to improve after yielding nearly 421 yards per game in 2023 (109th of 130 FBS teams). Third-down defense was the Golden Eagles’ upside as opponents converted just 38% of opportunities.

PLAYERS TO WATCH

Southern Miss linebacker Dylan Lawrence made a team-high 78 tackles last season and will again be counted on to set the tone for a defense seeking overall improvement. He had just one of the Golden Eagles’ 25 sacks but was key to their third-down defense and 17 takeaways. Lawrence is among 25 graduates on the roster.

Kentucky junior defensive lineman Deone Walker and linebacker J.J. Weaver each had at least seven sacks last season and anchor one of the Wildcats’ deepest units under Mark Stoops. Walker has been projected as a possible first-round NFL draft pick; Weaver is back for a fifth season after passing on the draft last spring.

FACTS & FIGURES

The Golden Eagles were picked to finish sixth in the Sun Belt Conference West Division in a preseason poll of league coaches. … They are 4-16 against the SEC in season openers, earning their last win over Kentucky in 2016. … Wildcats receiver/returner Barion Brown has returned a kickoff for a touchdown in the past two openers. … Stoops begins his 12th season as the SEC’s longest-tenured coach following the January retirement of Nick Saban at Alabama. … The Wildcats received three votes in the preseason AP Top 25.

__

AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/college-football and https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll

Advertisement





Source link

Continue Reading
Advertisement
Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Kentucky

Nebraska lands Kentucky WR transfer Dane Key

Published

on

Nebraska lands Kentucky WR transfer Dane Key


Editor’s Note: This article first appeared on Rivals.com, the leader in college football and basketball recruiting coverage. Be the first to know and follow your teams by signing up here.

Matt Rhule sewed up a strong piece to the offensive puzzle for next season, landing former Kentucky wide receiver Dane Key. The 6-foot-3, 210-pounder will have one year of eligibility remaining.

Key picked the Cornhuskers over Ole Miss, Georgia and others.

Advertisement

Rhule snagged Key at the perfect time, he’s coming off his best season with the Wildcats, securing a career-high 47 receptions and receiving yards in 715 yards.

Key’s consistency will make him an instant impact player for Nebraska next season. He’s been a starter since his true freshman season and accumulated 1,870 yards on 126 receptions and scored 14 touchdowns.

Key checked in at No. 13 overall in the Rivals Portal rankings.


Stay locked in on the Rivals Transfer Tracker to keep up with the latest transfer news, portal entries, commitments, and rankings. For a deep-dive into the transfer portal, make sure you visit the Rivals Transfer Search page.

The Rivals Transfer Portal X account is a must-follow for any college football fan.

Advertisement

The winter college football transfer portal window is scheduled to open on December 9th, 2024 for 20 days. Additionally, players have a 30-day window to transfer when their head coach leaves. There is also a five-day window for players to transfer after their team has finished postseason play. A 10-day transfer window will open on April 16th as well.





Source link

Continue Reading

Kentucky

Lowlife dad who owes over $100K in child support arrested getting off cruise ship in Miami: officials

Published

on

Lowlife dad who owes over 0K in child support arrested getting off cruise ship in Miami: officials


A Kentucky dad who has racked up more than $100,000 in unpaid child support was arrested as he got off a cruise trip in Florida after several years on the lam, according to officials.  

Dominic Weaver’s vacation ended with him in handcuffs after he was taken into custody by local cops exiting the cruise ship in Miami sometime last week and brought back to Bluegrass State, Jefferson County Attorney Mike O’Connell told a local Louisville news station.

The 47-year-old owes somewhere between $114,000 and $120,000 in child support, according to O’Connell.

Dominic Weaver owes thousands in child support. Law and Crime

Weaver was previously sentenced to five years of probation for flagrant non-support in 2019, according to Law and Crime.

Advertisement

“I don’t know when he left, but he fled the jurisdiction, and from the date of his sentence until today, and even today, he’s not paid one cent of child support,” the Kentucky county official told WDRB.

O’Connell said Weaver has four cases with the child support division.

“This is one of the most egregious events that brings something to light that I think I’ve ever seen,” O’Connell told the news station.


The dad was arrested getting off a cruise ship, officials said.
The dad was arrested getting off a cruise ship in Miami and was brought back to Kentucky, officials said. Law and Crime

The official plans to ask the court to revoke his original sentence and instead get him behind bars for as long as four years.

The father’s lack of support for his kids is so poor he appeared on a 2021 list of parents that owe large sums of money for their children’s care. At the time, he owed nearly $100,000, according to county records.

Weaver’s arraignment is set for Jan. 6. 

Advertisement



Source link

Continue Reading

Kentucky

South Carolina lands talented player out of transfer portal following LaNorris Seller news

Published

on

South Carolina lands talented player out of transfer portal following LaNorris Seller news


Former Western Kentucky offensive lineman Rodney Newsom will transfer to play for South Carolina this upcoming season, On3’s Pete Nakos reported. Newsom spent just one season with the Hilltoppers and will have two years of eligibility remaining.

The 6-foot-3 offensive lineman played in all 14 games at WKU this past season. He joined the team in the offseason after spending one year at Itawamba Community College in Mississippi.

Newsom played high school football at Briarcrest Christian (TN), where he was a three-star recruit in the 2020 class. He ranked as the No. 2,256 overall player and No. 158 interior offensive lineman in the cycle according to the On3 Industry Ranking, a weighted average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies.

Newsom began his college career at Memphis and played two seasons with the Tigers prior to going to Itawamba. As a transfer, he ranks as the No. 119 overall player and No. 11 interior offensive lineman according to On3’s Transfer Portal Player Rankings.

Advertisement

Rodney Newsom is the seventh commitment in the Gamecocks’ transfer portal class, joining EDGE Jaylen Brown (Missouri), interior offensive lineman Nick Sharpe (Wake Forest), tight end Jordan Dingle (Kentucky), defensive tackle Gabriel Brownlow-Dindy (Texas A&M), LB Shawn Murphy, and QB Air Noland (OSU).

The portal officially opened on Monday, Dec. 9, 2024. More than 2,800 FBS scholarship players entered their names into the NCAA’s transfer database during the 2023-24 school year. Removing those who withdrew or went pro, the final total sat at 2,707 transfers.

So far this cycle, 2,160 players have entered the transfer portal with 676 of those already having committed to new schools.

To keep up with the latest players on the move, check out On3’s Transfer Portal wire.

The On3 Transfer Portal Instagram account and Twitter account are excellent resources to stay up to date with the latest moves.

Advertisement

LaNorris Sellers signs new NIL deal with South Carolina for 2025 return

South Carolina star quarterback LaNorris Sellers has inked a new NIL deal with the Gamecocks’ NIL collective Garnet Trust, securing his return to Columbia for the 2025 season. Sellers holds an On3 NIL Valuation of $2.7 million.

His new deal now secures his return for 2025. Sellers put together an impressive 2024 season after taking over as South Carolina’s starting quarterback. He threw for 2,274 yards and 17 touchdowns in the air while adding 655 rushing yards and seven touchdowns on the ground.

Those numbers helped lead the Gamecocks to a 9-3 record, including a six-game win streak to end the year to just miss out on the College Football Playoff.

South Carolina had to hold off suitors for Sellers, as multiple schools made efforts in recent weeks for the quarterback to jump in the transfer portal. Garnet Trust declined to give specifics on the agreement but sources told On3 it’s on pace with other top quarterback deals in college football.

“Ever since the LSU game, he’s been having programs reach out to his people,” a Power 4 personnel staffer recently told On3 about the LaNorris Sellers situation. “Then as he kept balling out he’s only had more and more programs reach out. I mean he had playoff-caliber teams blowing up his phone like crazy before the Clemson game. After? That shit hasn’t stopped ringing.”

Advertisement

On3’s Pete Nakos contributed to this report.





Source link

Continue Reading

Trending