Rich Brooks promotes Mark Stoops’ ‘pretty impressive’ tenure at Kentucky, calls for statue

Rich Brooks has long been a big-time supporter of Mark Stoops, and the former Kentucky coach has taken it a step further and said the Wildcats should honor Stoops in a big way.

“For what Mark Stoops has done there, they oughta build him a statue,” Brooks said Tuesday on the KSR Preshow. “It’s pretty impressive.”

Brooks understands the Kentucky job, and appreciates Stoops’ work since Brooks himself was the head coach from 2003-09, and he arrived when the program was on probation with limited scholarships and resources.

Stoops became the program’s all-time winningest coach this past season and was previously named SEC Coach of the Year in 2018, the program’s first since 1983.

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Stoops led UK to 7 consecutive bowl trips and that featured a pair of 10-win seasons and 4 straight bowl victories in the Citrus (2), Belk and Gator Bowls.

Brooks has stayed in contact with the program, and was on hand last month when the program named the field in the practice facility after Brooks and his wife.

The field inside newly renovated Nutter Field House will be named Rich and Karen Brooks Field.

? @UKcoachbrooks pic.twitter.com/bF7AEw29ME

— Kentucky Football (@UKFootball) July 10, 2023

Keith Farner

A former newspaper veteran, Keith Farner is a news manager for Saturday Down South.