UK Wins The Close One
Kentucky won a close very physical hard fought game. On a day that John Wall was not at this best he came up with the biggest block of his young college career. Cousins overcame an evening where he got beat up on the boards and whenever he touched the ball around the basket. Besides the block that Wall had at the end of the game there was one other huge play in my mind that stands out. The basket interference call at 7:56 with UK down 44-43 was big. From my view of the call, which was basically looking right down at the basket, there was no doubt that it was a bad call. However, I will also say that UK deserved to have a call go there way. This was a game that I felt the ref’s let many easy calls go and made a lot of questionable calls that hurt UK.
Key to the Game
The biggest key to the game in my opinion was UK’s ability to put together a great defensive plan and communicate at a level that they have not done all season long. The team talked helping each other find the open three point shooters with only a few getting wide open looks. Bledsoe for the first time all season long did an excellent job not giving up the back door. Bledsoe has had a very bad problem of relaxing when the ball swings away from his man and giving them an easy look at the basket. Today he stayed in his stance and made sure that he covered all cuts towards the basket.
Patterson
Patrick Patterson had another big day and made another big 3 to push UK to victory. For most of the middle part of the schedule Patterson did not play at the level that Coach Cal and everyone else thought he should be playing at. South Carolina was his low point of the year and since then he has gradually brought himself back into All-American form. Patterson finished the game with 13 points and 13 rebounds which is one of his better rebounding games of the year. Coach Cal said in his post game comments that he has been telling Patterson to just play, he wants him to get 25 points and 15 rebounds every game. Cal also added that Patterson needs to quit deferring to the other players and go get his.
Bad Offensive Stats
In a game that UK had pretty bad numbers in all aspects of shooting they were able to pull out the win. Coach Cal said that he loves this kind of game. UK shot 35.8% from the field, 18.8% from 3 point range and 56.7% from the line. On top of the bad shooting today the Cats were out rebounded 40-36 and only managed to get 10 offensive rebounds (2 in the first half). Needless to say, this was not UK’s best game of the year, but I have to totally agree with Cal that it is a great win. To see UK play defense at the level they did in order to get the win is very encouraging. They are going to need a lot of that Thursday when Devon Downey comes to town. I will say that Downey is over rated beyond belief and that if John Wall, Bledsoe, Patterson or Cousins took as many shots as Downey they would probably average 40 points a game.
The Haters Continue
As I am sitting in the suite here at Memorial Gym, I am listening to the national media bash UK and how “it is an unwritten rule that you do not blow the whistle on UK at the end of the game”. Directly in front of me there is also a very well known member of the national media talking about how full of crap Calipari is and that he never gets his facts right. I will agree that Coach Cal does see things a little different than those in the media, but I must add that there are a lot in the media that have a very skewed view of the game as well. I will not mention individuals names, because I don’t do that, but CBS and ESPN do have some serious UK haters. That is part of the being UK and I welcome it with every insult or complaint.
Great Day
Today was a great day to be a UK fan as we closed out another very close game. I got to meet some of my favorite people in the college basketball world and will remember this day for a long long time.