Kentucky 73 - 51 Arkansas-Little Rock (in Louisville) (No. 2,066)

Over the course of any basketball season, I tend to build up fairly elaborate game-time rituals -- especially if the Cats are winning. Last year, our run to the Final Four contributed to the creation of a whole set of rituals that involved apps on my iPad and iPhone, various channels on XM radio, and a basketball in my rec room. This year's rituals involve a cap, a blackboard, a laptop computer, and a (different) iPhone app.

One of the many reasons that Christianity is better than superstition is that the demands of Christianity are much less onerous. If you have wondered about Jesus's teaching that His yoke is easy and His burden is light, try keeping up the pagan rituals that can be generated by superstition.

Now tonight's game started at 7 P.M., which meant that I couldn't get home for the opening tip. Given that the Cats were playing the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, I thought that maybe I would skip the usual formalities and just watch the game on a different TV without all of the rituals. Of course, when I turned on the game UK was trailing 8-7 with seven minutes already gone. I turned everything off and ate dinner. But when I checked in again, UK trailed 30-27 at the half. And so -- back to the rec room, the blackboard, the hat, et cetera. Number 3 son trailed along to watch with our new mascot -- a stuffed white seal with a "UK Wildcats" logo made by Number 3 son. (It was a Christmas gift to me.)

Having mollified whatever spirits care about sports rituals, I waited for the results. They were not long in coming. With support from me, the hat, the blackboard, Number 3 son -- and the seal -- the Wildcats crushed the Trojans 46-21 in the second half, and cruised home to a 73-51 victory.

I'm sure that Coach Cal and the players think that the difference was that they out-rebounded the Trojans 47-19, that they finally started hitting some three's, that they stopped making turnovers, that Anthony Davis went 9-11 from the field and finished with 22 points and 16 rebounds, that Terrence Jones scored 10 points and chipped in 6 rebounds, that Doron Lamb was a more effective point guard than Marquis Teague, and that UK played amazing second-half defense. But what makes superstition so insidious is that to me, it feels like my rituals made a difference.

Anyway, the Cats are now 14-1 for the year, and conference play is up next. I'm very concerned about their outside shooting -- they were 6-16 from behind the arc tonight, which is OK but not great -- and I'm very nervous as to how they will play on the road in conference. Teague's game is also all over the place -- he was pretty bad tonight, which is the main reason UK had 19 turnovers. And I'm worried about Jones.

But I'm amazed at Cal's ability to consistently get effort out of young players. This is a long season, and it is only natural for young guys to get bored or lose focus from time to time. Nevertheless, they did come out in the second half and smoke UALR -- and my guess is their hard work was a lot more important to the final score than my hat.

One final note: congrats to Darius Miller for scoring his 1000th point as a Kentucky Wildcat. He really is one of my very favorite Cats, and I hope Eric will say more about him as the year goes on.