GAINESVILLE — Feleipe Franks to Tyrie Cleveland certainly breathed life into a Florida season headed the wrong direction following the opening defeat to Michigan.

Next up is a hungry and unbeaten Kentucky team in what figures to be a hostile, juiced-up environment at Kroger Field. At his Monday afternoon press conference, Jim McElwain praised Kentucky while acknowledging that his team needs to quickly move forward from its emotional win over Tennessee on Saturday.

“It was a great win in The Swamp, but the key now is to build on that, get ready to go play on the road against a team that’s won a bunch of games in their last bit, have been playing as well as anyone is in the league,” McElwain said. “It’s going to be a crazy place. I know they’re looking forward to it. Our guys have got to understand, in order for us to go in and play well and with confidence, we’ve got to do the things we need to do in practice this week to give us an opportunity going against a really good team.”

Florida’s win streak over Kentucky now stands at 30, the longest active program-vs.-program winning streak in college football and the fourth-longest in NCAA history. If the Gators want to build on Saturday’s stunning finish at The Swamp and extend the streak over Kentucky to 31, they will need to be more effective both running the football and stopping the run.

Offensively, that won’t be an easy task.

New defensive coordinator Matt House has Kentucky playing outstanding run defense, converting a glaring weakness of the football team into a strength. Jim McElwain noted the challenge Florida will have establishing the run on the road Saturday night.

“Nobody’s running the football on them,” McElwain told reporters Monday. “When you’re not running it, that makes you one-dimensional. It’s a credit to what (head coach Mark Stoops) and his staff have been able to do (this season).”

How much has Kentucky improved stopping the run?

The Wildcats closed last season allowing 376 yards to Tennessee (9.2 ypa), 257 to lowly Austin-Peay (4.8 ypa), 280 to Louisville (6.2 ypa) and 266 (5.2 ypa) in a bowl loss to Georgia Tech. This year, perhaps buttressed by the return of their top three defensive linemen and top five tacklers at linebacker, the Wildcats enter the weekend third nationally in rushing defense, allowing only 2.19 yards per attempt and 57 yards per game. Even factoring in that none of Big Blue’s first three opponents (Southern Miss, Eastern Kentucky and South Carolina) are particularly prolific rushing offenses, these are staggering numbers that give the Cats a huge edge against Florida on paper.

The Gators enter the weekend with a ground attack ranked 117 out of 128 FBS teams, averaging a meek 3.1 yards an attempt and without a single rushing touchdown.

“It’s going to be tough,” Florida offensive tackle Jawaan Taylor told Chris Harry of Floridagators.com on Monday. “We’re just going to have to prepare in practice. We know they have a good defense, and it’s going to be a challenge for our offensive line.”

Even if Florida runs the ball with some modicum of success, they’ll be run out of Lexington with an L if they don’t tackle better than they did against the Volunteers.

Credit: Mark Zerof-USA TODAY Sports

That’s because in Benny Snell Jr. (above), Kentucky has a back every bit as powerful and talented as Tennessee had in John Kelly. The sophomore from Ohio ran for 1,091 yards as a freshman last season despite only starting seven games, averaging a remarkable 5.9 a carry. What’s more, at 5-11 and 225, he’s a downhill bowling ball who wears defenses out, which proved kryptonite to a young Gators defense against Kelly and the Volunteers. A summer knee injury to star left tackle Cole Mosier has hurt Kentucky a bit in the run game early this season, but Snell has still eclipsed 100 yards in two of Big Blue’s first three contests and has three rushing touchdowns.

Florida will need all hands on deck to stop the run, and it can’t afford to miss as many tackles as it did against Tennessee. The summer injury to the team’s best tackler, Marcell Harris, has surely hurt, but the Gators will need better tackling from Chauncey Gardner, who was woeful against Tennessee, and a linebacker corps that figures to again play without its best run-stopper, Kylan Johnson.

The two keys to the game complement each other, of course.

If Florida can run the ball effectively on offense, it can control clock and keep the defense off the field, which the Gators failed to do against the Vols, particularly in the final three quarters when Tennessee possessed the ball nearly 27 of the 45 minutes. Kentucky used 32 carries by Snell and the threat of quarterback Stephen Johnson’s legs on RPOs to accumulate 37-plus minutes of possession in their 23-13 win at South Carolina. Florida must do better than Will Muschamp’s defense if it hopes to leave Lexington undefeated in SEC play.

There have been a fair number of “close calls” in Florida’s 30-game winning streak over Kentucky, from McElwain’s first trip to Lexington, a 14-9 win, to the triple-OT win in The Swamp, to the famed “Doering’s got a Touchdown” play in 1993. In all likelihood, Saturday’s game promises to be another close one. Whether Florida improves running and stopping the run will make or break the streak.