Kentucky coach Mark Stoops knows it will be special facing his alma mater Iowa in the Citrus Bowl

Mark Stoops may bleed the blue and white as coach at Kentucky, but to his core, there will always be a soft spot for the black and gold of the Iowa Hawkeyes. It’s a connection that runs deep in the Stoops family, one that’s intertwined its way through the lives of Mark and his brothers Bob and Mike.

The brothers played defensive back at different times for legendary coach Hayden Fry at Iowa. Each Stoops brother chose to don the No. 41 jersey during their time with the Hawkeyes. A jersey that meant so much to the family that it wound up buried with their father, Ron Sr.

So, when Mark Stoops found out his current team would face his alma mater in the Citrus Bowl on New Year’s Day at Camping World Stadium in Orlando, the news left him speechless.

“It’s hard to put into words what the Iowa program has meant to us,” Stoops said.

Kentucky is coming off a 9-3 season, its best since a 10-3 campaign in 2018. Ironically, the Wildcats capped off that season with an impressive 27-24 win over Penn State in the Citrus Bowl.

In his nine seasons in Lexington, Stoops, 54, has guided the program through a football renaissance. Kentucky went from a 2-win season in 2013 to 10-wins in 2018. The Wildcats have appeared in a school-record six straight bowl games under Stoops’ guidance.

But there was always a special connection to the Iowa football program. It all began with road trips from his home in Youngstown, Ohio, to Iowa City, Iowa, with his father.

“I remember as a young child, going and getting in the car, playing football games on Friday night, my dad coaching on Friday night,” Stoops recalled. “Getting in the car, driving 10 hours, arriving in the morning, watching my brothers play, and staying Saturday night, getting back in the car, driving another 10 hours back home.”

Stoops would eventually follow his brothers to Iowa, playing defensive back from 1986-88. By his admission, his skills as a player were nothing to behold.

“I was not very impressive as a player, that’s for sure,” said Stoops. “I was a very average player.”

Iowa coach Kirk Ferentz, the offensive line coach for the Hawkeyes, remembers Stoops recruiting visit to campus.

“I’ll never forget when Mark was in on his visit, and I walked by [defensive coordinator] Bill’s [Brazier] office and he was talking to Mark,” said Ferentz. “Later, we had a staff meeting after the recruiting weekend, and Bill commented, ‘You know, if this weren’t a Stoops, I would have sworn there’s no way this guy is going to be a college football player.’

“His point was Mark at that time probably looked like he was 15, just a young-looking high school senior. Coach [Fry] had his mind made up on that one already and certainly; it panned out.”

Stoops’ playing career ended before it began.

“I became a starter my junior year and then that was short-lived,” he said. “I blew out my knee about — I got back from my father’s funeral on Wednesday and blew out my knee against Michigan on Saturday. That was about the end of my career.”

During the time of his father’s passing, who died of a heart attack following a high school football game, Stoops felt the close bond of the coaching staff.

“I’ll tell you what kind of people Hayden Fry is and was and the rest of his staff was, when my father passed during the season, they took a plane and came to my father’s funeral,” said Stoops. “I know we were getting ready to play Michigan the following week.

“The experience with Coach Hayden Fry and all the assistant coaches, the people of Iowa, everybody was just so good to us during our time there. It helped shape a lot of what we became,” said Stoops.

Bob, Mike and Mark would follow in their father’s footsteps and get into coaching, as did their older brother Ron Jr. A move that didn’t surprise Ferentz, who’s spent the past 23 years as the Hawkeyes coach.

“All three of them were all cut from the same cloth,” said Ferentz. “They just looked at football a little differently, and most college football players do. It was in the blood and that’s something they grew up with.”

That special connection makes this opportunity to face his former school so much of a challenge for Stoops.

“It will be different for me,” Stoops said. “Being that my father has my game jersey from the Hawkeyes, very neatly folded and put — and placed in his casket where he’s buried in my jersey with the black and gold.

“It definitely will mean something to me, different from anybody else I’ve played against, that’s for sure.”