The Mark Stoops era of Kentucky football is over as Pete Thamel of ESPN, Jeff Drummond of Rivals and Chris Low of On3 have all reported Kentucky is set to fire Stoops tomorrow.  

After Kentucky was blown out 41-0 by Louisville, all eyes turned to UK Athletic Director Mitch Barnhart and the future of the program.

It was a very anxious  30+ hours from the ending of the blowout to the announcement of the departure.

The move also comes after Stoops finished 5-7 and missed out on a bowl game for a second straight season.

Stoops was the longest-tenured head coach in the SEC at 13 seasons coming into 2025, but now he adds to the long list of vacancies all across the conference. 

Stoops and the Wildcats have had some tough times dating back to 2024, where the program lost its eight-year bowl steak and was on a 10 game SEC losing streak before beating Auburn and Florida this season.

Looking past the recent downfall, Stoops brought Kentucky football to levels it had not seen in a long time, if not ever, as he will leave the program as the winningest coach in school history with 72 wins (10 were vacated by NCAA due to violations) along with records for SEC wins and wins over ranked opponents.

Many good things came from Stoops’ time at Kentucky like the first wins in a very long time on the road against Florida and Tennessee or just wins at all against those two programs. 

However, the very expectations he set for this program are ones he has not been able to live up to in the past few seasons. 

With Stoops now out as head coach, Kentucky will now begin its first search for a new football coach since the winter of 2012.