Question Marks Remain

     In a season in which we've already seen Ole Miss lose to Jacksonville State and Virginia Tech lose to James Madison, we should have known UK couldn't just mail in a win over Western Kentucky. 
     Instead the Cats kicked off to Western, and the Hilltoppers promptly marched right down the field and scored.  It looked like the Cats were trying to get by with only 7 defenders instead of 11.   They made WKU tailback Bobby Rainey look like Walter Payton.  Rainey ran 59 yards for a touchdown on only the third play of the game enroute to a career high 182 yard game. 
     Rainey is not a big guy at all, but twice in the second half he managed to drag 6 or 7 UK tacklers for several more yards after the initial contact.  It dawned on me after that happened the second time that Kentucky's linebacking corps is less than awesome and maybe less than adequate.  It really makes you wonder what some of the best tailbacks in the SEC are going to do against Kentucky.
     After a game in which UK scored 63 points and won by 35, I'm a lot more worried about this season than I was after the season opening win over Louisville.  Their kick-off coverage was a little shakey against the Cards, and it sure didn't get any better against Western who got a 90 yard return for a touchdown by freshman Willie McNeal. 
     UK freshman Joe Manseur has a strong leg, but he kicks off the way I hit my driver on the golf course.  Neither one of us have any idea where the ball is going.  And when he kicks it someplace other than where his coverage team is expecting it to go, bad things happen.
     Fortunately, the Cats have a great kick return game of their own.  Randall Cobb's 50 yard punt return for a score was a thing of beauty, and I'm beginning to think this guy may just be one of the two or three best players in all of college football this season.  Cobb also threw a touchdown pass and caught one as well.
     Mike Hartline meanwhile continues to look downright solid at quarterback.
He made a lot of good throws against Western as he spread the ball around to his stable of capable receivers, and when offensive coordinator Randy Sanders called a designed run for Hartline, he showed enough athletic ability to get all the way to the end zone.
     When Joker broke out the second and third teamers, several of them really caught my eye.  True freshman running back Raymond Sanders showed a great burst on two straight runs that netted him his first collegiate touchdown, and Morgan Newton showed that if Hartline goes down with an injury, UK still will be well represented at quarterback.  I wish Ryan Mossakowski had gotten a chance to show off his passing ability, but I realize by the time he got in the game, it wouldn't have been very sportsmanlike for UK to still be tossing the ball around.
     Unfortunately, next weeks game against Akron isn't going to tell us much that we don't already know, and I'm still afraid that unless the UK defense improves tremendously over the next two weeks, it's going to be even more vulnerable against SEC competition.
     UK fans better enjoy this unbeaten status while we can.