UK's men's basketball team is number 10 in the latest AP Poll. UK has an all-time record of 58-19 as the nation's Number 10 team. The Cats' best win as Number 10 was on March 12, 1994, when the Cats beat number-1 Arkansas 90-78 in the semi-finals of the SEC Tournament. UK went 16-36 from three-point land in that game, with Travis Ford going 5-7. That game is one of my all-time favorites, and I still remember it very fondly.
For the 11th season in a row, I want to say that I'm really happy that Calipari doesn't make UK play tournaments during Thanksgiving Week. We have to play Duke/KU/Michigan State in that one event, and UCLA/UNC/Ohio State in another, and then we also have to play Louisville and at least one other big team (this year it's Notre Dame on the road). Plus we're in the SEC/Big XII challenge, which this year means a trip to KU. That's more than enough -- let us enjoy Thanksgiving Week.
ReplyDeleteUK always has a lot of guys who don't play. Tonight Lance Ware is out, and so is Davion Mintz. C.J. Fredrick, a transfer from Iowa who was supposed to help with outside shooting, is out for the year with a hamstring injury. This sort of thing happens to UK all the time, and I have no idea why. I really believe the 2012 was the only year since Cal got here where the Cats were healthy from beginning to end.
ReplyDeleteK-Pom has the Cats winning this game 80-54, so we'll see what happens. They started off with an 8-3 lead, then Tshiebwe was called for a foul and Cal took him out of the game, and now UK leads 10-7 with 15:21 left in the first half. I hope they aren't going to play the whole first half without Tshiebwe again.
ReplyDeleteMark Story, who thought that UK should have kept Billy Gillespie after the 2009 season, just tweeted out a picture of the empty seats at Rupp. That's the sort of thing that happens after a 9-16 season. If UK wants more fans, it should field better teams.
ReplyDeleteTshiebwe is back in the game, and he makes a jumper to put UK up 12-9. If you miss the days of Jack Sikma and big guys who took jump shots, you should really be watching the Cats.
ReplyDeleteCats up 25-17 with 6:41 left in the first. Tshiebwe has 6 points and 9 rebounds; Tyty Washington has 9 points and 2 rebounds.
ReplyDeleteCats lead 27-21 with 4:10 left. UK has now committed 9 turnovers. Albany is playing extraordinarily hard and they are making UK play faster than they should. To play fast, you must have good passers and ball handlers, and that's not UK's game.
ReplyDeleteTshiebwe's on the bench with two fouls, Albany's players are just hurling themselves all over the floor, and the game is being played at a tremendous pace. With Tshiebwe gone, the Great Danes are getting all the 50-50 balls and they have cut UK's lead to 31-26 with 2:20 left.
ReplyDeleteUK gets more into the spirit of the thing, and bodies fly all over the place in the last two minutes of the half. UK leads 37-28 with 20 minutes left. Washington has 13 points and 3 rebounds. Wheeler has 9 points and 3 assists. Tshiebwe still has 6 points and 9 rebounds. Cats go 2-6 from 3-point range, and 14-21 from 2-point range.
ReplyDeleteNow it's halftime, and they're doing a segment showing some of the UK players playing pool on a UK-themed pool table. The felt is Kentucky blue, with the UK logo on it. I would like to have that pool table. But what's even better is that they have small national championship banners on the wall for 1948, 1949, 1951, 1958, 1978, 1996, 1998, and 2012. I would really like those for my basement.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that's troubling about this UK team is that they don't get to the line. UK is 346th in the country in free throw attempts per field goal attempts.
ReplyDeleteThey just don't get fouled all that often; they're always taking jump shots. And when they try to get to the basket, they often commit turnovers. So that's a problem.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, they're third in the nation in percentage of offensive rebounds. It's strange that the same team would be so good at rebounding and so weak at getting to the line.
ReplyDeleteI've seen teams in the Sweet 16 with less intensity than Albany. You have people on the floor almost every possession. Tshiebwe's already gone with a third foul. UK leads 41-33 with 17:13 left.
ReplyDeleteUsually I care a lot about how we do compared to Ken Pom's predictions, but in this game I just want to win and not have anyone get hurt.
ReplyDeleteWith 16:52 left, UK leads 43-35 and Albany goes to a full-court press. Calipari calls time.
ReplyDeleteUK was up 48-35 with 13 1/2 minutes left when Tshiebwe got his fourth foul. So here we go again. He's on the bench, and the score is now 48-37 with just under 13 minutes to go.
ReplyDeleteWith Tshiebwe on the bench, Washington hits a three and has a nice lob pass to Grady that leads to a free throw. UK leads 52-39 with 11:36 left. Washington now has 18 points and 5 rebounds. Tshiebwe with 6 points and 10 rebounds. Wheeler has 11 points, 4 rebounds, and 4 assists. Oh, and Brooks has 9 points and 6 rebounds. This team loves to rebound.
ReplyDeleteAlbany finally starting to get tired, and UK leads 59-39 with 8:50 left.
ReplyDeleteCats up 61-43 with 7:30 to go. UK has outrebounded Albany 41-18 so far. The Cats will not win this game by 26, as Ken Pom had predicted, so they may slip in the rankings. But they have played hard.
ReplyDeleteWith 3:10 left, UK leads 76-53, so the score will likely be closer to Ken Pom's prediction than I expected. We've had some foul shots down the stretch, and the Cats have run some very pretty back door plays.
ReplyDeleteTshiebwe hit a jumper to put UK up 78-53 -- very close to Ken Pom's prediction of 80-54. And then Albany came down and took a bad three-pointer -- but it banked in. Cats up 78-56. Then Collins had an easy dunk off of a lob pass. But he missed it.
ReplyDeleteCats end up winning 86-61 -- one point short of Ken Pom's predicted victory margin. So they should stay where they are; right around number 12 in the rankings. Tshiebwe finished with 12 points and 14 rebounds. Washington had 20 points and 6 rebounds. Wheeler had 15 points and 7 assists. Brooks had 17 points and 8 rebounds. Grady had 14 points. UK had 13 assists and 17 turnovers, which always makes a game look ugly. But they outrebounded Albany 51-28, which is incredible.
ReplyDeleteYou can analyze UK as much as you want, but the truth is that Ken Pom's analysis of them appears to be extremely accurate right now. And by that analysis, they're basically a Sweet 16-quality team that will play an enormous number of close games between now and early March. Here was the top of the SEC, according to Pomeroy, when UK tipped off tonight:
ReplyDelete11. Tennessee
12. Kentucky
14. Alabama
18. Florida
23. Arkansas
29. Auburn
30. LSU
UK will play two games against Tennessee, two games against Alabama, two games against Florida, two games against LSU, one game at Arkansas, and one game at Auburn. That's ten games that are basically toss-ups. UK also has a game at number-36 Notre Dame, and a game with number-21 Ohio State, and those are also toss-ups. That's 12 games where UK's chance of victory ranges from a low of 38 percent to a high of 63 percent -- basically coin tosses.
Pomeroy thinks the extra road game will lead to a 5-7 record for UK in those games. He also thinks they'll take a loss at Kansas, and they'll drop two extra games somewhere. That will give them a record of 11-7 in the SEC and 21-10 overall, which would probably put them in the tournament as a number-8 seed. But that would be a mistake, because they would actually be the 12th-best team in the country.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, luck could break in their favor, and they could finish with something like 14-4 in the SEC and 24-7 overall, which would probably put them in as a 4 seed -- or a 3 seed if they win the SEC Tournament.
ReplyDeleteEither way UK fans are in for a whole heap of drama this season. Large portions of the season will be painful, but it will certainly be more fun than last year.
ReplyDeleteAnd these guys do play hard.
ReplyDeleteIn the last two games, Brooks has made 16-26 two point shots. You have to see this to believe it -- he has this very high shot that seems to stay in the air forever. When he misses, it looks horrible. But when the defense leaves him alone from 15 feet out, and he splashes in one of those high, floating shots, you feel transported back to the late 1970's.
ReplyDeleteCats fall from 12 to 13 on Ken Pom. Top of the SEC now looks like this:
ReplyDelete11. Tennessee
12. Florida
13. Kentucky
15. Alabama
24. Arkansas
25. LSU
30. Auburn
Cats rank 12th in Offensive Efficiency, and 32d in Defensive Efficiency. They are 159th in tempo, and 285th in luck.
ReplyDeleteIf you want to feel better about the Cats, watch this game between Saint Mary's and Oregon. The score is 19-13 for the Gaels with only 2:19 left in the first half.
ReplyDeleteTonight, number-1 Gonzaga (in the AP Poll) will play number-2 UCLA. Since I became a fan, UK has played in five of these 1 v. 2 AP games. Here are the scores:
ReplyDelete03/31/1975: (1) UCLA 92, Kentucky 85 (National Championship)
12/26/1981: (1) N. Carolina 82, Kentucky 69
03/30/1996: (2) Kentucky 81, Massachusetts 74 (Final Four)
11/12/2013: (2) Michigan St. 78, Kentucky 74
11/05/2019: (2) Kentucky 69, Michigan St. 62
K-Pom had Gonzaga winning this game 81-75; the Zags already lead 24-8 with 12 minutes left in the first half. If the Zags beat Duke on Friday, they will go into the NCAA Tournament with a perfect record for the second year in a row.
ReplyDeleteAfter ten minutes, the Zags are up 29-8.
ReplyDeleteZags lead 33-10 with 8:35 left in the first half. UCLA has already called three of its four timeouts. It will be interesting to see how they do against Duke. The Zags usually struggle with physical teams, and Duke certainly has some guys who can get to the hoop.
ReplyDeleteZags up 33-12 with 7:17 left. They are 5-9 from 3-point range so far. You have no chance if they're hot from the outside. Last year in the National Championship game, they went 5-17, and that killed them. In 2019, they were 33-3 going into the Elite Eight game with Texas Tech, went 7-26 from three-point range, and lost 75-69. So a really good team can beat them if they're cold from the outside. But if they're hot from the outside, you have no chance.
ReplyDeleteOne thing I really like about having a team that shoots a lot of three's -- and knows how to shoot them -- is that you get about ten games a year where you're really hot from the outside and the other team just has no chance.
ReplyDeleteOn the other hand, if you go cold from the outside -- like UK did against UNC in 1995 and against West Virginia in 2010 -- then you're in big trouble.
ReplyDelete