LEX18.com - Lexington, KY

Posted: Oct 13, 2009 11:24 PM

Joker Phillips almost always has something to say.  As the orchestrator of the offense, he knows the quarterbacks inside and out.

But this week, his lips are sealed.

"If it's a quarterback question, Rich (Brooks) is handling all of that this week.  We'll talk about it next week though," said Phillips.

He's not talking about the quarterbacks, and they're not talking either.  But Joker doesn't believe that this adversity will affect the psyche of his team.  He says they've been tough all year and has no problems with their effort.  He expects the effort level will be the same against Auburn on Saturday, but mentally they need to be more focused.

"Our team, a lot of them don't know any better.  They're playing hard.  Anybody that's watching us, any other team that puts on the tape, they'll see our team's playing hard.  We've got to play smarter."

Joker stressed that with or without Mike Hartline, Kentucky is a good football team.  A team that is right on the verge of breaking through.

"We're really, really close.  We are a good football team.  I know some people don't realize that, but we are really close to being a really good football team.  We're probably about 15 sloppy plays from being 4-1."

A couple of plays in the Alabama game, a couple of plays in the South Carolina game.  It's true.  The Cats could be 4-1.  The reality is, they're 2-3 and now have to find away to get enough wins to get to that fourth straight bowl game.

"We're still a good football team," said UK's head coach of offense.

" I think if we can focus for 60 minutes, we're definitely a more physical football team than we were in week one.  We are becoming a sloppy team in a short period.  But we've cut that down.  Now we need to make it two or three plays instead of six or seven plays a game and we'll see the production go up."