Cats Want to Prove Their Mettle – Again – in Big Dance
John Calipari had an opportunity to deliver an opening statement after Kentucky won the Southeastern Conference Tournament championship, but he didn’t start where you might have expected.
He didn’t talk about Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s 29 points and MVP honors. He didn’t bring up Wenyen Gabriel’s go-ahead put-back. He didn’t mention Sacha Killeya-Jones rim-rattling dunk.
Instead, Calipari thought back to the lowest moment of the game for the Wildcats.
“We got up 17, and then we gave up three 3 to (Admiral) Schofield,” Calipari said.
Tennessee – the regular-season SEC co-champion and now NCAA Tournament No. 3 seed – had landed a series of haymakers to close within five at the end of the first half. Believe it or not, Coach Cal loved it.
“Told them at halftime it’s good because this is what’s going to happen in the next tournament, something like this,” Calipari said. “Now let’s figure out what we’re about.”
The Cats, of course, showed their mettle and won their fourth straight SEC Tournament title. They will now rely on that same mettle to carry them to a deep run through a difficult bracket in the “next tournament.”
“I like the way we responded to that Tennessee run,” Wenyen Gabriel said. “We got up big and that’s what’s going to happen in March. You get up big and a team makes a run, they come back. When they took a lead, Cal called a timeout. We were forced to respond and the way we responded showed a lot of what we can do and what we’re capable of. I was proud of us.”
The Cats – tabbed a No. 5 seed in the NCAA Tournament – are riding a wave of confidence as they prepare for a matchup with No. 12 Davidson at 7:10 p.m. ET at Taco Bell Arena in Boise, Idaho. Having won seven of eight games, UK has made a four-game losing streak in February a distant memory and is now playing its best basketball when it matters most.
“It’s what we built for,” Calipari said. “It’s what we go through the steps of. So, happy for the kids. I’m happy for Wenyen, I’m happy for Sacha, Quade’s (Green) playing better, PJ’s (Washington) playing better. They’re all playing better.”
That improved play led to some hardware and lots of good vibes on Sunday afternoon in St. Louis.
“We just won a couple of big games and we won the SEC championship, so we feel great,” Hamidou Diallo said. “We’re feeling good about ourselves and we just gotta make sure we polish things up this week and take care of our bodies and make sure we’re at 100 percent on Thursday.”
That will be a tougher task than normal, as UK will have to open the NCAA Tournament less than four days after playing on Sunday with a cross-country flight in between. Then, Kentucky would play a potential fifth game in eight days should it advance to the second round on Saturday.
The Cats wouldn’t have it any other way.
“It’s the end of the season,” Diallo said. “This is why we train so hard and this is what you practice so hard for, being able to play in tough, back-to-back games.”
Diallo had a front-row seat for last year’s NCAA Tournament, sitting as a redshirt as UK advanced to the Elite Eight. Gabriel, meanwhile, is the only Wildcat who has seen the floor in March Madness, but even his role was limited. Nonetheless, he’ll be passing on his experience.
“I didn’t play too much last year, but this year my message to them is just focus on the game at hand,” Gabriel said. “We take it one game at a time and stay locked in. The intensity that we brought to this tournament, we gotta play the next game just like that.”
That intensity is what Calipari has been trying to coax out of the Cats for months on end. Now that they are delivering consistently, he’s ready to take them to be tested at the highest level.
“I like my team,” Calipari said. “Let’s go see what we are.”
