By LARRY VAUGHT
ESPN’s Chris Low got UK offensive coordinator Rich Scangarello to make a bold prediction about Kentucky quarterback Will Levis before the Cats played and lost 22-19 at Ole Miss last week when Levis had two costly late fumbles.
Scangarello spent the five previous seasons in the NFL with Denver and San Francisco. He was Denver’s offensive coordinator in 2019.
Kentucky coach Mark Stoops called Scangarello a “quarterback guru” because of his coaching not only in the NFL but the work he has done with young quarterbacks during his career.
“Will is as talented as anyone I’ve evaluated the last five years. The only two guys I would compare him to, where you could see it clearly, would be Joe Burrow and Josh Allen,” said Scangarello.
Burrow, the former LSU quarterback, got the Bengals to the Super Bowl last year. Allen is the reason the Buffalo Bills are favored by many to win the Super Bowl this year.
“I think he (Levis) will be the first overall pick in the (2023) draft,” Scangarello said.
Levis was being criticized by many after the Ole Miss loss but UK associate coach Vince Marrow, who predicted in the summer that Levis would be one of the first quarterbacks drafted, posted this on Twitter after the Mississippi loss.
“All you dudes taking shots at Will Levis don’t have a clue what the heck y’all talking. Will is a great leader and puts his body on the line every game. We wouldn’t trade him for any QB in the country. The hype is real,” Marrow said.
Levis is 97 of 141 passing for 1,405 yards and 12 touchdowns with four interceptions in five games this season. He insisted after the Ole Miss loss that Kentucky’s goals could still be reached even though future games against Mississippi State and Missouri suddenly look a lot more difficult after last week’s results.
“I mean we still have everything we want on the table for us. We just have to take it one week, one game, one day at a time,” Levis said. “I’m really proud of how our guys battled. We have a lot of guys banged up.
“We showed that we can win games like this. We should’ve won. We’re obviously doing things right and we just have to keep trusting our operations.”