If Mark Stoops beats Florida again, the SEC’s longest coaching marriage has to continue, right?

If you’re old enough, the strains of Frank Sinatra’s “Love and Marriage” conjure up one thing. No, I don’t mind for octogenarians who remember Old Blue Eyes, I mean for TV viewers of the 1990s (or later, for those who love reruns). TV’s Married With Children was the saga of Al Bundy and his wife, Peggy. Sinatra’s tune was an obvious joke, because while the marriage of Al and Peggy continued, the love was … well … questionable. Al and Peggy were both well past their respective primes held together by inertia as much as love.

Strangely, Kentucky football has its own Bundy-esque situation these days.

There was a time when a pair of 10-win seasons in Lexington would put a coach solidly into legendary status. (They renamed a street for Hal Mumme after a 2-1 start in 1997, for goodness’ sake). There was a time when a streak of 8 consecutive seasons of bowl appearances would be cause for couch burning, not coach burning.

But here they are, the SEC’s longest tenured head football coach and a fan base that is growing increasingly impatient with impotent offense, head-scratching losses, and 7-5 seasons that are softer than premium toilet paper. If Mark Stoops sat down on the sofa and jammed his hand into his pants like Al Bundy, the comparison couldn’t be more ripe.

Here’s the thing, though. For all of Kentucky’s fan grievances (and there are some, and they are pretty solid), Saturday presents an opportunity for an occasion of wonder. A Kentucky coach who has suddenly owned Florida.

If you think that’s a small thing, they maybe you missed 1987 to 2018, a span of 31 years … and 31 Florida victories. That streak ran from before Florida was elite until the height of the Spurrier years, through the following decline, back up into the Meyer years, and back through the mediocrity that followed. Sure, sometimes Florida was great. Sometimes, they were fairly awful. But they always beat Kentucky. Sometimes it was 72-7 or 65-0. Sometimes, Florida had to overcome a 21-3 4th-quarter deficit or win despite throwing seven interceptions. But they did.

Stoops ended that streak in 2018 and is 3-2 against Florida since. In fact, he’s won 3 in a row and has a chance for 4 in a row over Florida on Saturday. The last coach at Kentucky to win 4 games in a row over Florida? That’d be Bear Bryant. The last to win 5? Has never happened.

In a microcosm, the Florida streak sums up Stoops’ situation. Yes, Florida has been miserable. But they had been miserable before and had beaten Kentucky into submission. Yes, the past 2 years with wins over Florida still ended up as 7-6 seasons. (Was there ever a time when Kentucky fans thought they could beat Florida and go to a bowl and be unsatisfied?)

But if Stoops beats Florida 4 times in a row — and in Gainesville in 3 of his past 4 visits — how can Big Blue Nation turn him away?

Again, the reasons to be dissatisfied are there. The offense is archaic and brutal. Losses to Vanderbilt and South Carolina seem to suggest that maybe the Gators’ standing vis-a-vis other SEC schools has flipped. Stoops’ continued tone-deaf comments about NIL and battles with the basketball program aren’t earning any brownie points, either.

But at a program known (if for anything) for irrelevance, Stoops has a chance to add another notch to the growing list of achievements he has amassed with Kentucky football.

Maybe he’ll stick around. Maybe it’ll be a little bit begrudging on both sides. It’s a marriage that might not be long on love. But if the Wildcats beat Florida, it’s probably still a marriage.

Joe Cox

Joe Cox is a columnist for Saturday Down South. He has also written or assisted in writing five books, and his most recent, Almost Perfect (a study of baseball pitchers’ near-miss attempts at perfect games), is available on Amazon or at many local bookstores.