December 3, 2025 • 9 mins
Will Stein is the new Head Football Coach at the University of Kentucky. Jeff Piecoro joined us to discuss.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is ESPN fifteen thirty. The University of Kentucky has
a new football coach, Will Stein, who is a Kentucky native.
His dad played at Kentucky. Will went to Louisville. He
replaces Mark Stoops, who had been in Lexington for I
think the last thirty five years. Jeff Picoro, color analyst
UK football, longtime friend of this show. In this radio
(00:22):
station ABC thirty six, and Lexington is with us high pick.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
How are you, mo? I'm well yourself, I'm great.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
I am so fun to be on the show with you.
And let me just say this, thirdbody can hear us.
I'm so happy Tony is back too, because the two
of you are fantastic together.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Well you and me both. And that's way too kind
of you. Why let's before we look ahead, let's look back.
Why did things kind of get sideways under Mark Stoops
the last couple of years.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
Well, you know, Mo, every job you take, you're always
looking to get to better yourself. And I think three
years ago, you know, he had one foot out the
door to Texas A and M and I think he
came back to bite.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Him a little bit. And I just I don't know
if you say.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
The fire wasn't there, but it just, you know, I
just don't believe you're gonna have guys like Joe Paterno
and Wood he hates anymore.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
That's Stavin. Look at Saban, you.
Speaker 3 (01:16):
Know, ten twelve, fourteen years.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
That's about it.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
At one job, they you know, five years ago, they
were ready to build statues for Mark and they were
also gonna build a statue for John Caliperi, and then
they couldn't wait till they both of them left.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
It's amazing.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Now you're right about that. Will Stein is the guy?
Are you excited about this?
Speaker 3 (01:39):
I am? And because okay, Moller's quarterback, right, Matt Konatowski.
He's a four star quarterbacks number twelve, fourteenth in the country.
He has said that he has not waivered one bit.
He's actually going to be at tomorrow. They're having a
big press conference to introduce Stein to everyone, and he
(02:00):
said he's going to be there and show his support
for his new coach.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
So that's kind of cool.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
All right, very good. Why is he the guy?
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Well, I mean, you could look at the offense that
Oregon has. I mean, there are two offenses that are
absolutely ridiculous in college football. I'm sure there's a lot more,
but you look at Oregon, you look at a higher state.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Both of them close to five hundred yards.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
Two years ago, Oregon's offense averaged over five hundred yards
a game. They averaged this year thirty nine points, last
year thirty eight.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
The year before was over forty.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
So look, in this era of college football, you have
to score to win, and I don't mean seventeen points.
Those days are gone of seventeen fourteen scores.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
If you can't.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Score twenty eight points in a game, you're not going
to win very many. He's an exciting brand. He's a
younger guy. He's embraced the nil and the transfer portal,
and that's the thing that took you know, you look
at all these older coaches who are I.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Can't do this. Nick Saban, he's you know, you have
thought he coached forever.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
He just said, I'm not into paying these kids, and
you know, uh so, I think it's huge that whatever
program you have, be at Cincinnati, Kentucky or USC you've
got to have somebody that understands the nuances of now
college football.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Is does he inherit a roster where he's gonna want
most of those guys back.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Uh yeah, I think that this is a this is
a really good roster that there was one thing here
you were, there is two things you're You were very
senior oriented, especially in the offensive line, but everywhere else.
It was a great sophomore class this year that Stoops
brought in two and some three years ago because.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
A lot of them were also red shirts.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
He's got a kid like Cutter bowlliet quarterback who's still
three more years to play, a great building block, two.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Running backs coming back. The weakness is going.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
To be offensive line, but the defensive line is stout.
The secondary is really good. They've got two juco players
that have committed and another one yesterday, six twenty five pounders.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
So it's a pretty good roster. Mote really is.
Speaker 3 (04:10):
I just think that there was a little staleness around
the program and that's gone now and I think there's
a lot of excitement. Look, you want to bring somebody
in that's going to cite the fan base. And it
was between Heartline and Ohio State and Stein that was
the final two. And with Heartline, you know that it's
just a part time gig for him until Ryan Day
(04:30):
leaves and he takes a job at Ohio State, so
I'd love to have Heartline here. I think he's a
fantastic coach, but a kid like Stein would be here
for ten or twelve.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Years with Mark Steubs. And look, he had ten win seasons.
He accomplished a lot. But it did feel at the
end like it was time. After the Louisville game, he
was emphatic, I'm not going anywhere. You wouldn't expect him
to have, given the fact that you know he'd be
leaving a lot of money on the table, but just
given what he had done and given that buyout that
he's going to get, were you surprised that things went
(05:02):
down at the end of the way. They did.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
Not, particularly because he he and Mitch Barnhardt, the athletic director,
sat down and I in his contract if he was terminated,
which would have been with Sunday, in his contract with
sixty days, they had totained thirty seven point seven million
dollars and that was the sticking point. And he went
in and I don't know what the final numbers were
(05:25):
or the years, but he he I guess, gave in
and said, look, we can spread this out. I wanted
to make this as amicable as possible. And just today,
about thirty minutes ago, well, he put out a really
nice statement saying, you know, he thanked the university, all
his players, coaches, and Big Blue Nation and you know,
blah blah blah. But the key was spreading that out. Now.
(05:46):
I don't know if it's ten years.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
It's still three point seven million a year.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
That's a pretty good stalary for the next ten years
for sitting on.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
You know, sitting on your back porch and smoking a cigar.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
I'd like, I'd like to do exactly that with a
fracture of that kind of money from an NIL person.
And this is the question that gets asked with every
job in America, every coach that gets hired. What's the
NIL situation? Is it good? Is it where it needs
to be? Where's it going to be under the new guy?
Speaker 2 (06:12):
I think it's good, but not great.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
And the reason I say that is because you have
to remember there's a behemoth here that feeds the Commonwealth
and that Kentucky Basketball, and they have to get their share.
You know, you know, they only give you twenty million
dollars in the SEC, so it's not split fifty to
(06:35):
fifty but it's it's a pretty pretty fair amount goes
to the basketball team, you know.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
Yeah, So I mean, is there is there a ground
swell of support to increase that for football? As will Stein,
that is going to be asked about nil, what should
this look like realistically moving forward for football?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (06:56):
I think we could talk about this all day. But basically,
the twenty million is what is given to you by
the NCAA, and then anything outside of that has to
be a true nil, meaning you can't just pay a
guy money. He has to do a commercial. He has
to actually do something supposedly for the money.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Right.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
You can't just say here's a car and one hundred
thousand dollars come to our school.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
You know.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
So that's the deal. And and JMI, which is the
media outlet for the University of Kentuck.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
I think lear Field is for Cincinnati. You would know that.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
But you know, they pay a lot of money and
they're the ones that kind of the gatekeeper for NIL.
They have a huge collective down here that they take
care of. And that's one of the buckets is how
do we got twenty how do we fill these other
buckets to match that? As it just for instance, you know,
Laying Kiffin. Supposedly, Alice you said, we'll give you twenty
(07:54):
five million dollars to build a football team.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
So that's what you're up against.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
All right, So you got Kentucky and Carolina tonight, and
then amid all this, the volleyball team might win a
national title, right.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
Wow, you know that's the thing that's crazy. They're gonna
be at home all the way to the Final four
as a number one seed and the number two team
in the nation.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
So it's pretty exciting. I don't know if you've ever been.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
It's really cool to go see in a person, it's
it's it's actually a pretty exciting and fun event to
go see.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
But they're good.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
But yeah, basketball team plays North Carolina tonight at ninet
thirty and then they turn around to play gonzag on Friday.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
It's there.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
I'll tell you what people wanted them to play this hard,
hard schedule. So Mark Posts is sure I'll take anybody. Well,
he's lost twice already on national television to Louisville Michigan State.
Here's the problem, b You're probably gonna lose four or
five games in conference. Right if you lose to North
Carolina tonight and possibly to gonzag on Friday. Now you're
(08:53):
up against it in trying to get into just get
into the Ncity Tournament with all these losses.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Yeah, and Mark Mark Pope looked like he was looking
for a rope after that Michigan State game, which was
not encouraging. All right, tell me quickly. You know will
Stein's dad pretty well?
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Right, Yeah, Matt and I were roommates back then, and
Tony will tell you all about this. We had what
was supposed to be two a days, but three days
we lived. So we lived on campus together in the
dorm and he was my roommate my sophomore year. So yeah,
he's a great guy. He played defensive end. He's an
attorney in Louisville now and still a huge He and
(09:28):
his wife both are UK graduates. So it'll be fun
to see him tomorrow at the press conference.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
All right, you have a lot going on. I appreciate
the time as always, men, Thanks so much anytime.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Oh,
This is ESPN fifteen thirty. The University of Kentucky has
a new football coach, Will Stein, who is a Kentucky native.
His dad played at Kentucky. Will went to Louisville. He
replaces Mark Stoops, who had been in Lexington for I
think the last thirty five years. Jeff Picoro, color analyst
UK football, longtime friend of this show. In this radio
(00:22):
station ABC thirty six, and Lexington is with us high pick.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
How are you, mo? I'm well yourself, I'm great.
Speaker 3 (00:33):
I am so fun to be on the show with you.
And let me just say this, thirdbody can hear us.
I'm so happy Tony is back too, because the two
of you are fantastic together.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Well you and me both. And that's way too kind
of you. Why let's before we look ahead, let's look back.
Why did things kind of get sideways under Mark Stoops
the last couple of years.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
Well, you know, Mo, every job you take, you're always
looking to get to better yourself. And I think three
years ago, you know, he had one foot out the
door to Texas A and M and I think he
came back to bite.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
Him a little bit. And I just I don't know
if you say.
Speaker 3 (01:07):
The fire wasn't there, but it just, you know, I
just don't believe you're gonna have guys like Joe Paterno
and Wood he hates anymore.
Speaker 2 (01:14):
That's Stavin. Look at Saban, you.
Speaker 3 (01:16):
Know, ten twelve, fourteen years.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
That's about it.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
At one job, they you know, five years ago, they
were ready to build statues for Mark and they were
also gonna build a statue for John Caliperi, and then
they couldn't wait till they both of them left.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
It's amazing.
Speaker 1 (01:33):
Now you're right about that. Will Stein is the guy?
Are you excited about this?
Speaker 3 (01:39):
I am? And because okay, Moller's quarterback, right, Matt Konatowski.
He's a four star quarterbacks number twelve, fourteenth in the country.
He has said that he has not waivered one bit.
He's actually going to be at tomorrow. They're having a
big press conference to introduce Stein to everyone, and he
(02:00):
said he's going to be there and show his support
for his new coach.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
So that's kind of cool.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
All right, very good. Why is he the guy?
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Well, I mean, you could look at the offense that
Oregon has. I mean, there are two offenses that are
absolutely ridiculous in college football. I'm sure there's a lot more,
but you look at Oregon, you look at a higher state.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Both of them close to five hundred yards.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
Two years ago, Oregon's offense averaged over five hundred yards
a game. They averaged this year thirty nine points, last
year thirty eight.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
The year before was over forty.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
So look, in this era of college football, you have
to score to win, and I don't mean seventeen points.
Those days are gone of seventeen fourteen scores.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
If you can't.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Score twenty eight points in a game, you're not going
to win very many. He's an exciting brand. He's a
younger guy. He's embraced the nil and the transfer portal,
and that's the thing that took you know, you look
at all these older coaches who are I.
Speaker 2 (03:00):
Can't do this. Nick Saban, he's you know, you have
thought he coached forever.
Speaker 3 (03:05):
He just said, I'm not into paying these kids, and
you know, uh so, I think it's huge that whatever
program you have, be at Cincinnati, Kentucky or USC you've
got to have somebody that understands the nuances of now
college football.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Is does he inherit a roster where he's gonna want
most of those guys back.
Speaker 3 (03:28):
Uh yeah, I think that this is a this is
a really good roster that there was one thing here
you were, there is two things you're You were very
senior oriented, especially in the offensive line, but everywhere else.
It was a great sophomore class this year that Stoops
brought in two and some three years ago because.
Speaker 2 (03:46):
A lot of them were also red shirts.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
He's got a kid like Cutter bowlliet quarterback who's still
three more years to play, a great building block, two.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Running backs coming back. The weakness is going.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
To be offensive line, but the defensive line is stout.
The secondary is really good. They've got two juco players
that have committed and another one yesterday, six twenty five pounders.
Speaker 2 (04:07):
So it's a pretty good roster. Mote really is.
Speaker 3 (04:10):
I just think that there was a little staleness around
the program and that's gone now and I think there's
a lot of excitement. Look, you want to bring somebody
in that's going to cite the fan base. And it
was between Heartline and Ohio State and Stein that was
the final two. And with Heartline, you know that it's
just a part time gig for him until Ryan Day
(04:30):
leaves and he takes a job at Ohio State, so
I'd love to have Heartline here. I think he's a
fantastic coach, but a kid like Stein would be here
for ten or twelve.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
Years with Mark Steubs. And look, he had ten win seasons.
He accomplished a lot. But it did feel at the
end like it was time. After the Louisville game, he
was emphatic, I'm not going anywhere. You wouldn't expect him
to have, given the fact that you know he'd be
leaving a lot of money on the table, but just
given what he had done and given that buyout that
he's going to get, were you surprised that things went
(05:02):
down at the end of the way. They did.
Speaker 3 (05:04):
Not, particularly because he he and Mitch Barnhardt, the athletic director,
sat down and I in his contract if he was terminated,
which would have been with Sunday, in his contract with
sixty days, they had totained thirty seven point seven million
dollars and that was the sticking point. And he went
in and I don't know what the final numbers were
(05:25):
or the years, but he he I guess, gave in
and said, look, we can spread this out. I wanted
to make this as amicable as possible. And just today,
about thirty minutes ago, well, he put out a really
nice statement saying, you know, he thanked the university, all
his players, coaches, and Big Blue Nation and you know,
blah blah blah. But the key was spreading that out. Now.
(05:46):
I don't know if it's ten years.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
It's still three point seven million a year.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
That's a pretty good stalary for the next ten years
for sitting on.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
You know, sitting on your back porch and smoking a cigar.
Speaker 1 (05:54):
I'd like, I'd like to do exactly that with a
fracture of that kind of money from an NIL person.
And this is the question that gets asked with every
job in America, every coach that gets hired. What's the
NIL situation? Is it good? Is it where it needs
to be? Where's it going to be under the new guy?
Speaker 2 (06:12):
I think it's good, but not great.
Speaker 3 (06:15):
And the reason I say that is because you have
to remember there's a behemoth here that feeds the Commonwealth
and that Kentucky Basketball, and they have to get their share.
You know, you know, they only give you twenty million
dollars in the SEC, so it's not split fifty to
(06:35):
fifty but it's it's a pretty pretty fair amount goes
to the basketball team, you know.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
Yeah, So I mean, is there is there a ground
swell of support to increase that for football? As will Stein,
that is going to be asked about nil, what should
this look like realistically moving forward for football?
Speaker 2 (06:56):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (06:56):
I think we could talk about this all day. But basically,
the twenty million is what is given to you by
the NCAA, and then anything outside of that has to
be a true nil, meaning you can't just pay a
guy money. He has to do a commercial. He has
to actually do something supposedly for the money.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Right.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
You can't just say here's a car and one hundred
thousand dollars come to our school.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
You know.
Speaker 3 (07:22):
So that's the deal. And and JMI, which is the
media outlet for the University of Kentuck.
Speaker 2 (07:30):
I think lear Field is for Cincinnati. You would know that.
Speaker 3 (07:33):
But you know, they pay a lot of money and
they're the ones that kind of the gatekeeper for NIL.
They have a huge collective down here that they take
care of. And that's one of the buckets is how
do we got twenty how do we fill these other
buckets to match that? As it just for instance, you know,
Laying Kiffin. Supposedly, Alice you said, we'll give you twenty
(07:54):
five million dollars to build a football team.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
So that's what you're up against.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
All right, So you got Kentucky and Carolina tonight, and
then amid all this, the volleyball team might win a
national title, right.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
Wow, you know that's the thing that's crazy. They're gonna
be at home all the way to the Final four
as a number one seed and the number two team
in the nation.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
So it's pretty exciting. I don't know if you've ever been.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
It's really cool to go see in a person, it's
it's it's actually a pretty exciting and fun event to
go see.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
But they're good.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
But yeah, basketball team plays North Carolina tonight at ninet
thirty and then they turn around to play gonzag on Friday.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
It's there.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
I'll tell you what people wanted them to play this hard,
hard schedule. So Mark Posts is sure I'll take anybody. Well,
he's lost twice already on national television to Louisville Michigan State.
Here's the problem, b You're probably gonna lose four or
five games in conference. Right if you lose to North
Carolina tonight and possibly to gonzag on Friday. Now you're
(08:53):
up against it in trying to get into just get
into the Ncity Tournament with all these losses.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Yeah, and Mark Mark Pope looked like he was looking
for a rope after that Michigan State game, which was
not encouraging. All right, tell me quickly. You know will
Stein's dad pretty well?
Speaker 3 (09:08):
Right, Yeah, Matt and I were roommates back then, and
Tony will tell you all about this. We had what
was supposed to be two a days, but three days
we lived. So we lived on campus together in the
dorm and he was my roommate my sophomore year. So yeah,
he's a great guy. He played defensive end. He's an
attorney in Louisville now and still a huge He and
(09:28):
his wife both are UK graduates. So it'll be fun
to see him tomorrow at the press conference.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
All right, you have a lot going on. I appreciate
the time as always, men, Thanks so much anytime.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Oh,
Mo Egger News
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