Kentucky didn’t need a miracle in overtime. They just needed one open lane — and Kenny Minchey found it.

LSU scored first in the extra period when Sam Leavitt ran 15 yards for a touchdown. After the extra point made it 34–27, Kentucky needed a touchdown just to keep the game alive.

The Wildcats got it. On third-and-8, Minchey hit freshman Kenny Darby with a short pass, and Darby cut through traffic before dragging tacklers all the way to the LSU 1. CJ Baxter scored two plays later. Then Will Stein held up two fingers.

Kentucky spread five receivers across the field, and LSU widened with them. That left a huge opening in the middle. Minchey saw it and ran straight through it for the two-point conversion.

Kentucky 35, No. 10 LSU 34.

Minchey didn’t have to overthink the play:

There was nobody in the middle, so I figured I’d run there.

It wasn’t even the original call. Stein said Minchey had permission to take off if LSU showed him a light box, and with the game resting on one snap, Minchey made the right read.

The wild part is that Kentucky had pulled off almost the exact same finish last week. South Carolina scored first in overtime. Kentucky answered with a touchdown, went for two, and won 35–34.

That time, Minchey threw the conversion to Willie Rodriguez. This time, he kept it. Same score, same decision, different answer.

Kentucky Had to Work to Get There

It’s not like the Wildcats played a clean game and just needed one gutsy call to finish things off. For most of the fourth quarter, they looked like they were trying to hand this one right back to LSU.

LSU led 27–24 after a receiver threw a 41-yard touchdown pass. Kentucky drove into field-goal range, but Adam Zouagui missed from 42 yards. The Wildcats then forced a Leavitt fumble and recovered at the LSU 13. Zouagui missed again, this time from 26.

That should’ve been enough for LSU to escape Lexington. Instead, the Tigers had a fourth-and-1 at their own 43 with 1:46 left. Kiffin punted. Kentucky took over at their own 19 with 1:37 remaining, worked their way into range, and Zouagui finally came through with a 33-yarder with 12 seconds left.

Kiffin said he thought about going for the first down, but Kentucky’s two missed kicks convinced him to trust his defense and punt. You can understand the math. You can also see why it’ll stick with him: one yard might’ve ended the game before Stein ever got to hold up those two fingers.

Kentucky had been making LSU sweat well before that finish. On the Wildcats’ first offensive snap, Baxter broke loose for a 77-yard run and scored on the next play. Brock Coffman took a punt 55 yards to the house. Minchey capped a 75-yard drive with a fourth-and-goal sneak on the final play of the first half, sending Kentucky into the locker room with a 21–17 lead.

Baxter finished with 123 rushing yards and two touchdowns. Minchey threw for 246 yards without an interception. Kentucky’s defense gave up 34 points, but they also forced two turnovers and held an LSU offense that had been averaging 547.8 yards coming in to 410.

LSU Had Chances to End It

LSU had their moments. The Tigers scored on a double flea-flicker, got the go-ahead touchdown on a pass from Harris, and watched Leavitt run in the overtime score. But they also turned it over twice, gave up a punt-return touchdown, and couldn’t close the game after taking the lead. There’s plenty there for Kiffin to stew over besides the punt.

For Kentucky, this is getting harder to write off as a fun little run. The Wildcats were unranked in the AP poll entering Saturday, even though they were No. 25 in the Coaches Poll. Now they’re 5–1 under first-year coach Stein, 3–1 in the SEC, and they’ve beaten two AP top-10 teams after winning at No. 9 Texas A&M in September. Sunday’s AP poll moved Kentucky up to No. 15.

LSU dropped to No. 22. Kiffin’s first Tigers team is 4–2 overall and 1–2 in conference play, with road losses to Ole Miss and now Kentucky. A spot in the 12-team playoff is still there, but the margin for error is getting pretty thin. Mississippi State comes to Baton Rouge next week, and Alabama and Texas are still on the schedule, along with trips to Auburn, Tennessee, and Arkansas.

Yikes.

But for the second straight week, Kentucky needed two yards to win. For the second straight week, they got them.

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