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Can UK's defense 'make a jump' this season? Stoops says it can and it will.

There was an urgency to Mark Stoops’ voice last week on a radio show in Alabama.

“Defensively, we need to make a big jump as far as being more consistent,” the Kentucky head coach said on the “Three Man Front” show based out of Birmingham. “We’ve seen flashes and done some really good things at times, but across the board, I’d like to see the consistency there.”

Perhaps no position group has been more inconsistent for Stoops than the one he has helped coach most of his career: the secondary.

After finishing fifth in the Southeastern Conference in pass defense in 2015 and 2016, the Cats fell to No.