Washington

As the Heath Post predicted, the Washington Huskies destroyed UVA last night by a score of 106-63. UW made 17 of 26 three's, which is the type of shooting that will win a lot of games. So the Huskies and the Wildcats will meet tonight at 9:30 Eastern time (8:30 Central) on ESPN.

Washington is ranked number 13 in the AP poll, but they looked a lot better than that last night. This will be the first real challenge for Kentucky this year, and it will be interesting to see how the young Cats respond. We will hope that Ken Pomeroy's prediction is not as accurate as it was last night, because he has Washington beating UK 77-76. On the other hand, UK has an all-time record of 14-4 against teams ranked number 13 in the AP poll.

UK and Washington have only played one other time. In 1985, UK barely made it into the NCAA tournament with a record of 16-12. The Cats were the number 12 seed in the West, and on March 14, 1985 they played the number 5 seed -- Washington -- in Salt Lake City. Kentucky pulled the upset by 66-58 behind 29 points and 10 rebounds from Kenny Walker. This was Joe Hall's next-to-last win as coach of the Big Blue. Two nights later, UK pulled an even bigger upset, beating number 4 seed UNLV 64-61 to reach the Sweet 16. The Cats were eliminated in the next round by St. John's, and Hall announced his retirement soon thereafter.

One final point. Washington's best player is named Isaiah Thomas -- no relation (so far as I know) to the more famous Isiah Thomas who played for Indiana in the early 1980s. UK played two games against that Isiah Thomas, and won both of them. On December 15, 1979, the #5 Wildcats knocked off the #1 Hoosiers 69-58 at Rupp. The next year, on December 6, 1980, the # 2 Wildcats beat the #5 Hoosiers 68-66 in Bloomington. Of course, IU went on to win the national championship that year, while UK ended its season with a loss to UAB, so I suppose Isiah Thomas had the last laugh after all.