March 16, 1999
By TIM WHITMIRE
AP Sports Writer
LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) – The tattoo on Wayne Turner’s left bicep shows aglobeand the words “Wayne’s World.”
That doesn’t mean, however, that Turner or any other member of theKentuckyteam thinks he is the sole answer to Miami of Ohio forward Wally Szczerbiak,better known as “Wally World.”
The message Tuesday from coach Tubby Smith and the Wildcat players wasthatif Kentucky (27-8) is to beat Miami (24-7) in Friday’s third-round NCAAtournament game in St. Louis, it will be with a team effort.
“No one individual can beat a team,” center Jamaal Magloire said whenasked whether Szczerbiak can singlehandedly beat Kentucky, as he did inscoring43 points in a first-round win over Washington. “Granted, he’s a good player.But no one player can beat us. No one player can beat a team.”
Just two weeks ago, Kentucky was coming off a 3-4 February and a fourthstraight Final Four trip for the Wildcats seemed unlikely. Now, the Wildcatsare 5-0 in March and two wins away from a trip to St. Petersburg, Fla.
After juggling starting lineups and substitution patterns for most of theregular season, Smith has settled into a rotation where he rests startersScottPadgett, Heshimu Evans, Wayne Turner, Desmond Allison and Michael Bradleyaboutfour or five minutes into each game and sends out a whole new second unit ofMagloire, forwards Tayshaun Prince and Jules Camara and guards Ryan Hogan andSaul Smith.
“That’s a good time for us to try and press” opposing teams, who usuallydon’t have the same depth as Kentucky, Smith said. “We’re hoping we canfatigue them a bit and then bring the first unit back in.
“We try to wear people down with our bench strength.”
The tactic has served Kentucky well in the postseason. In the SECchampionship game against Arkansas and again Sunday in the Wildcats’second-round NCAA win over Kansas, the second unit came off the bench to rallyKentucky from early deficits.
With Szczerbiak and the 10th-seeded RedHawks up next, fresh off theirupsetof second-seeded Utah, Smith said he did not plan any major changes to hisbasic ball-line, containment defense.
“We haven’t used any gimmick defenses all year long,” he said. “We’regoing to try to do something out of our regular man-to-man defense to try tolimit his (Szczerbiak’s) touches.”
With Szczerbiak equally skilled at posting up and stepping outside fortheperimeter jumpshot, as well as a strong passer and defender, Smith said thereis no glaring weakness for the Wildcats to attack. The coach said he likelywill try several different players on Szczerbiak, including senior forwardsPadgett and Evans.
“I don’t think there’s any one thing you can do to shut him down,” hesaid. “We’ll just try to deny him the ball as much as possible.”
Smith and Padgett said there’s more to Miami than Szczerbiak. Point guardRob Mestas is a calm floor leader and skilled at distributing the ball, Smithsaid. Guard Damon Frierson is averaging 13.1 points per game and the entireteam is skilled at getting Szczerbiak open for shots.
“I think more than anything, they feed off of when other teams go todoubleWally,” Padgett said. “They have a team. It’s not just Wally.”
Like Szczerbiak, the 6-foot-9 Padgett possesses inside-outsideversatility,as he showed down the stretch in the Kansas game. He hit a 3-pointer that sentthe game to overtime, nailed another long jumper to open the overtime, andthenwent inside to get to the foul line and make five free throws in the extrasession as Kentucky won 92-88.
Padgett said he has tried to focus on his post play in recent games.
“The more I post up, the more opportunities I get to get to thefree-throwline,” he said.
