{"id":774413,"date":"2026-02-25T01:50:34","date_gmt":"2026-02-25T01:50:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/774413\/"},"modified":"2026-02-25T01:50:34","modified_gmt":"2026-02-25T01:50:34","slug":"kentucky-is-a-cfp-sleeper-according-to-greg-mcelroy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/774413\/","title":{"rendered":"Kentucky is a CFP “Sleeper,” According to Greg McElroy"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s February, which means it\u2019s the perfect time to talk about Kentucky playing in the College Football Playoff. Yes, I know Kentucky only won four games last season, and the Cats have a first-year head coach facing one of the most difficult schedules in college football<\/a>. Doesn\u2019t matter. We\u2019re talking about it because one of the biggest voices in college football is saying it\u2019s a possibility. <\/p>\n

Former Alabama quarterback Greg McElroy is second only to Kirk Herbstreit on ESPN\u2019s college football broadcasting pecking order. He also hosts a daily morning show on JOX-FM in Birmingham with Cole Cubelic, and has his own ESPN podcast, Always College Football. <\/p>\n

In a recent edition of ACF, McElroy spent time talking about teams that typically won\u2019t be in the offseason CFP discussion. He shared ten \u201csleeper\u201d teams that he thinks could surprise college football fans because each team has quarterback clarity, a defined identity, and a schedule that provides a CFP path. Kentucky is one of those teams that meets all of the criteria. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re a sleeper because they are starting a new chapter. They\u2019ve moved on from Mark Stoops<\/a>, they hired Will Stein<\/a>, the former\u00a0Oregon\u00a0offensive coordinator, as their head coach,\u201d\u00a0McElroy said<\/a>. \u201cThat in itself is a pretty significant philosophical shift. Stein is viewed through an offensive lens, and Kentucky\u2019s identity under Stoops was defense, and toughness, and running the football.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, Stein will do all those things too, but it\u2019s going to be a little bit more quarterback-friendly. At quarterback, Kentucky landed Kenny Minchey<\/a> from Notre Dame. They flipped him over to Lexington, and that\u2019s a major storyline because it signals the new staff\u2019s direction. What will the 2026 identity look like? Can Kentucky maintain all the physicality that they\u2019ve played with over the last few years while modernizing the offense enough to win games that you need to maybe score 30-plus? That\u2019s the big question.<\/p>\n

Kenny Minchey was neck-and-neck with CJ Carr<\/a> last summer. Now, Carr is the preseason Heisman frontrunner<\/a>. If Stein can get Minchey to reach that ceiling, everything\u2019s on the table. But the schedule complicates things. <\/p>\n

Kentucky has a Difficult SEC Schedule<\/p>\n

A pessimist sees road trips to Texas A&M, South Carolina, Oklahoma, and Tennessee as immovable obstacles. McElroy views them as an opportunity for growth, particularly that early home game against Alabama. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe schedule is brutal, but it\u2019s going to force Kentucky to become real,\u201d McElroy said. \u201cThere is no easing your way into this schedule. So, if Stein\u2019s offense can create the same type of efficiency that he created at Oregon, even if it\u2019s not crazy explosive, and if Minchey can provide steady quarterback play, then Kentucky might be able to steal a couple games at home and maybe win enough to get to striking distance of the playoff in a 12-team world.\u201d<\/p>\n

We are not too naive to know that everything has to go UK\u2019s way to be in the CFP conversation in November. However, it\u2019s February. The time to dream big is now, and with Will Stein leading the program, no dream is too big. <\/p>\n

\u201cKentucky\u2019s lane (to the CFP) is narrow, but it does exist,\u201d said McElroy. \u201cYou better take care of business at home, you better be tough on the road, and hope that your new quarterback and coach partnership can grow into being a really nice partnership by the time November rolls around.\u201d<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s February, which means it\u2019s the perfect time to talk about Kentucky playing in the College Football Playoff.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":774414,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[7,54586,49,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-774413","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-kenny-minchey-23-pope-john-paul-ii","10":"tag-ncaa","11":"tag-ncaa-football"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116128768838912575","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774413","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=774413"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774413\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/774414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=774413"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=774413"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=774413"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}