Whatever can be said about Kentucky football fans, they are a largely patient people. A week after sitting en masse through a 2-hour weather delay to see barely a half of football against Southern Mississippi, Kentucky fans brought a very different site about late in the late third quarter of Kentucky’s 31-6 loss to South Carolina: They left Kroger Field.

With that departure seemingly went the dregs of the momentum that coach Mark Stoops has built in a remarkable tenure in Lexington. Yes, Stoops won 10 games twice in Lexington. But his Wildcats are now 2-8 in their past 10 conference home games. Consecutive 7-6 seasons have been barely salvaged by late wins over Louisville. But unless Jeff Brohm runs off his entire defensive roster, that streak over the Cardinals seems to be in jeopardy.

After the 2023 season, Texas A&M reportedly was a millimeter from hiring of Stoops rather than Mike Elko. Two games into 2024, it feels like that would have probably been a mutually beneficial move. Kentucky has lost games before — after all, this was 3 in a row to South Carolina. But this 31-6 beating wasn’t just the loss of a game, it felt like the loss of hope.

Kentucky went more than two quarters without completing a pass Saturday. For the game, the number of Wildcat completions (6) nearly was topped by the number of sacks allowed on Kentucky QBs (5). Against a South Carolina team that barely eeked out a one-score win over Old Dominion in Week 1, Kentucky got absolutely steamrolled.

The offensive line was horrifying, allowing 11 tackles for loss. At one point, QB Brock Vandagriff was so steamrolled that UK ran the ball on 17 consecutive plays. Not that it helped much. Kentucky finished the game with almost as many penalties (11) as first downs (13).

It’s tough to see where this team can turn for relief. Vandagriff was highly touted and looked very nice against an awful Southern Miss team in Week 1. But his first taste of SEC play certainly showed why Georgia might not have been in a hurry to take the keys to the offense from Carson Beck and turn them over to Vandagriff. His line: 3 for 10 passing for 30 yards and a pick didn’t help Kentucky make life easier.

In his defense, the offensive line played like they were remaking The Longest Yard and Vandagriff was the prison QB whom the linemen wanted to teach a lesson. When plays weren’t tackles for loss, Kentucky was holding. When Kentucky wasn’t holding, they sent Vandagriff scrambling for his life.

New offensive coordinator Bush Hamden looked completely lost. Offensive line coach Eric Wolford seemingly hasn’t taught his players to line up correctly, to block, or to avoid holding penalties. Even the defense, under Brad White, was weighed down enough to get thumped around by an opportunistic South Carolina attack.

At the end of the day, all the criticism has to be funneled to Stoops.

“Today it didn’t look like we were a really well-coached team and a team that didn’t really want to respond,” Stoops said. “That’s 100% on me and on us.”

After an offseason where he very publicly flirted with another job and then dismissed the modern coaching environment as untenable, a game plan that seemed not-existent and a staff and team that was ill-equipped to respond certainly falls under Stoops’ responsibility.

It’s not the first time in his Kentucky career that Stoops’ back has been against the wall. His 2014 and 2015 squads were doomed to losing seasons by some ridiculously silly mistakes and a lack of useful depth. In 2016, he faced Carolina in an early home battle that could have ended with him getting forced out of the job.

But after a pair of 10-win seasons, a wealth of offensive adjustments, and the addition of a variety of talented transfer portal standouts, those days were supposed to be in the past. Saturday was a vivid reminder that building up Kentucky, even to relatively modest heights, was a long and involved process. Slipping back to being a 5-7 or 4-8 SEC doormat could happen very quickly.

In the grand scheme of things, Kentucky’s 31-6 loss isn’t the end of hope. But it felt much more like a big step in that direction than just a random Week 2 loss. Those Wildcats fans leaving the stadium in the third quarter certainly suggested that narrative.