Welcome to Too Fast, Too Furious: Streets of the Southeastern Conference Edition.
As the very public, highly compelling University of Kentucky coaches’ war of words between football skipper Mark Stoops and basketball Hall of Famer John Calipari erupted in public view in recent weeks, Stoops issued about as direct a comment as possible toward his fellow beloved Bluegrass statesman when Stoops pointedly emphasized that “I stay in my lane.”
It was such a kerfuffle that UK athletics head Mitch Barnhart had to conduct an impromptu, nearly half-hour press conference before the assembled reporters in Lexington, Kentucky, to essentially tell the state of Kentucky’s two highest-paid adults to stop acting like children.
Except, Stoops has been perceived to have switched lanes in a perhaps Man O’War-drift maneuver to take a presumed shot at South Carolina second-year head football coach Shane Beamer.
"I talked years ago about climate versus culture,” Stoops said in an interview last month and surfaced in recent days. “It's easy to change a climate. You just change the uniforms, talk a little game, dance around and put on some stupid sunglasses and you can change a climate."
Those comments, fair or otherwise, were perceived as a direct shot across the bow of Beamer’s Gamecocks program, which was among the biggest surprise teams in college football last season with a 7-6 ledger punctuated by a win against rival North Carolina in the Duke’s Mayo Bowl to end the season.
Beamer, then, playing to a popular Tik Tok video trend, showed up to SEC Media Days last month in Atlanta and premiered his own catchy dance-video on the social media platform in which he donned some sunglasses, a backwards hat and oozed digital swag in what became a viral video.
Tuesday, Beamer updated the situation with Stoops.
“I saw the quote from SEC Media Days on Marty and McGee,” Beamer said of Stoops’s comments that were perceived to be about Beamer’s Gamecocks. “I saw the statement that he made last week. I appreciate Coach Stoops saying that it wasn’t directed at me. Like I said in an interview the other day, I have great respect for Mark and his program and the Kentucky program.
“I know when the basketball coach at Kentucky made the comment that he did about the (Kentucky) football program, Mark said that he stays in his lane. So, I can’t imagine that he would have gotten out of his lane to direct a shot at me. I said it the other day in an interview, Mark was very complimentary of our program before we played them last season and in fact, two or three of his assistant coaches came up to me during pre-game warmups last year to comment on the culture of our program and how impressed they were with it just from watching videos on social media and things like that.
“It is what it is. He’s got his program to worry about, and I’ve got mine to worry about. But no, my respect for him is still high and that program as well.”
Shane Beamer asked about Mark Stoops' recent comments.
— Mike Gillespie (@MikeAGillespie) August 23, 2022
"I can't imagine he would've gotten out of his lane to direct a shot at me." @abc_columbia pic.twitter.com/xFic8hpgAW
A year after his squad nearly upset the nationally-ranked Wildcats in a 16-10 home loss, Beamer gets a second shot at Kentucky Oct. 8 in the league’s latest movie installment, Too Fast, Too Furious: Football on Synthetic Bluegrass.