The UK men’s basketball team takes on Georgia on Wednesday at 8 p.m. in Athens, Ga. Head coach John Calipari and Georgia head coach Mark Fox joined the Southeastern Conference Coaches Teleconference on Monday to discuss the game.
Here’s what they had to say:
Kentucky coach John Calipari
On the matchup with Georgia on Wednesday …“I just can’t begin to tell you how much (Mark Fox’s) team has improved. What I saw from them when we played them, which seems like a year ago, earlier in the year, they’re just a much better team. Beating Florida, beating Tennessee by 20 – it wasn’t even a game – beating South Carolina and doing some of the things they’re doing and having Vanderbilt beat on the road, I know how hard that game must have been because we were there and barely beat them. This will be a hard game for us to win and that’s what it’s about late in the year. No one is going to fool anybody. It’s who wants it the most. Mark has done a great job with his team.”
On the chances of Ramon Harris playing more down the stretch …“If there’s an opportunity (he will play). The greatest thing that happened in (the Tennessee) game, and I said it before to my staff, is I said, ‘You know we ought to throw him back in there.’ Because one, he is a veteran and what’s happening is when you’re having seven or your eight top players are freshmen – four of them and three sophomores – they’ve not been in this position. I think throwing him in there for that alone would be good. I thought when we played him against Tennessee he did a good job. The best point of it was is DeMarcus (Cousins) on the bench is the one who told me to put in Ramon and let him try. I like to see that within our team.”
On what he looks for from Harris when he puts him in …“He talks on defense, he does all the right things, he’ll come up with tough balls. I believe he can make shots and he’s a player around the goal that can score. He made two free throws in the last game. I have confidence in him. It’s just that these other guys have played better at other points in the year, so I was playing them.”
On the need to hit outside shots against zones like the one Tennessee played against UK …“(Bruce Pearl) did it at home (to us) and we beat them pretty good. We were 2-for-22 from 3. I can remember they were saying my team at Memphis couldn’t win because we can’t make free throws. Now all of a sudden my team can’t make 3s. We’re a pretty good 3-point shooting team. You have spells that you don’t shoot it well. What I was proud of our team is shooting 2-for-22 from the 3 and it’s on the road and it’s 65-65 with two minutes to go. Incredible. The way they played where they held the ball gave us a chance. That’s how we stayed in the game.
“It’s funny, everybody will have the ‘this is how you play them.’ Yeah, if you hold your nose and close your eyes and hope we can’t make any shots. Yeah, that’s a good way to play. But if we make shots and we go for 5-for-22, which stinks, we win going away. Hats off to (Tennessee). They played hard. The beginning of the game is where we lost it. It wasn’t a game plan. Their players, not the coaches, their players came into that game out of desperation and outplayed us. They had 10 rebounds on us early in the game. By the time we settled down, you’re down 19. I think there’s all kinds of ways to play them. South Carolina played us man-to-man and beat us. Vanderbilt, a great coach, played us man-to-man. You could say it’s zone or man, but what you’re basically hoping is let’s hope they can’t make shots. My thing to my team, by the end of this year, the difference for us, just like when I was at Memphis and I said it, will be our free-throw shooting. I believe the difference for us (this year) will be our 3-point shooting. When we’re finishing this season out, people are going to say, ‘Wow, how do you guard them? They make 3s.’ I believe that’s what our team will do.”
On if he likes the looks his team is getting from behind the arc …“They’re wide open. We shot two air balls with no one on people. That’s what the dribble drive does. It’ll get you those kinds of shots. You’ve got to understand, we have a young team that was 27-1. We’re 27-2 now, we’re in the top five in the country. Every time you turn on SportsCenter, ESPN is making a living off this program and these players. It doesn’t matter if they don’t have a highlight, they put on a free throw. All of a sudden these guys are feeling a little, and I don’t blame them. At the start of the game, we were not in a mode of attack and we got attacked. There’s a bump and there’s a goaltend and there’s some things that the game wouldn’t have been a 10- or an 11-(point deficit); it would have been a four-(point deficit). Well, it happens. Guys miss this, miss that and all of a sudden you miss a shot and it gets away from you a little bit. That’s what happened at the beginning of the game. They had to have that start to beat us. Without that start they don’t beat us, and they did it. I give it to their players. They did it and they beat us.”
On freshmen making freshman mistakes and dealing with that for the rest of the season …“I thought Daniel (Orton) played well. He took a goofy shot. Those same freshmen got us back in the game, including DeMarcus Cousins and John Wall and Eric Bledsoe. We’re a freshman team. That’s what we are. They’re all 19 years old. You’ve got to live with some stuff. What I do like is their will to win. The plays down the stretch that were made were by the freshmen. The breakdowns, two of them were by a sophomore who played here (last year), which really hurt us. But that guy played well enough. Without him we’re not in the game because he made jump shots. Again, I like my team. I think we’ve got good players. Other guys who have McDonald’s All-Americans and good players try to downplay their players; I don’t. I think we have good players.
“There are things we’re going to have to do to take this to another level. I said before the game, I told my staff, ‘We’re going to have to lose one of these games before we finish the season.’ They said, ‘Why?’ I said, ‘Because we think we can play how we want to play and then we’ll come back and finish them off at the end.’ As we were ready to win the game, I looked at John Robic and I said, ‘You know what? You know how bad I want to win this game, but the reality of it is if we win this game we’ll never ever be able to tell these guys you can’t do this.’ So this ends up being a good thing for us. We could go to Georgia and lose two now because they’re an unbelievable team and they’re beating everybody down there now. This isn’t about the next game. It’s about, do we go in another direction? If we go in another direction, then it’s a good game for us. We were down 19 and then it’s 65-65 and we go for 2-for-22 from the 3-point line.”
On the things UK needs to do to get to the next level …“I think the intensity of play is one thing. I think we’ve got to get back to being intense. We’re going to do it in practice in our style of play. I think we have to defensively, be a little more active than what we do. We gave up layups in this game. You think about it, cross-court passes, throws, they had 10 points that were directly from us. And then in the half court they got about four or five layups which hasn’t happened to us all year. I just think there are things we’ve got to go back to and say unacceptable, these certain things. Lastly, I think we’ve got to have everybody that shows up and is ready to go and play. A noon game with no shootaround and then we had a 9 o’clock game (Thursday) and we traveled. You know what? They had every excuse to show up and do it, but I don’t want to hear that. We’re a team that is trying to do something special and that means you’ve got to figure out how do I get myself ready for every game. That is the first game we’ve played all year that I didn’t think we were ready to start the game. Every game we play is packed to the rafters and is a Super Bowl. Every one. I like to win every game, but there are times when there are good losses.
Georgia coach Mark Fox
On Georgia’s matchup with Kentucky on Wednesday …“We have arguably one of the best teams in the country who has proven that time and time again this year in Kentucky coming in Wednesday. I don’t know what the rankings are today, but they’re as good as advertised. They’re very complete, terrific in the interior, great playmakers in the backcourt and a team that is so talented that it maybe takes away from the attention their defense should get, because they’re a great defensive team and a terrific rebounding team. Those two things really stand out. We’ve got our hands full with a great team coming and we’re going to have to play extremely, extremely well to win on our Senior Night.”
On Kentucky’s defense and what impresses him about it …“First of all, Cal has been able to establish a commitment level from everyone on his team to defend. I think that’s where it starts. They’re just so long and big that they can obviously protect the basket and they’re quick so they can wreak havoc all over the place. I think they’re outstanding defensively.”
On any major changes UK has made defensively since the first outing …“I think they’re a much better team. I think they’re obviously more experienced, more poised. I think they’re much more comfortable because they’ve been through the wars. Their freshmen are starting to play like sophomores. They appear to know each other pretty well. Their chemistry appears to have improved, so I think they’re a lot better team than the first one we played.”
On Kentucky’s freshmen playing like sophomores …“Obviously John Wall has had a terrific year. He’s just making plays the clutch. (Daniel) Orton has continued to improve. The easiest way to say it is you don’t see as many freshman plays that maybe you saw earlier in the year. I think they’ve really matured.”
