UK alum Tom Leach has been the play-by-play “Voice of the Wildcats” for the football Cats for 13 years and 10 years for men’s basketball. He is a four-time winner of the Kentucky Sportscaster of the Year award. Leach offers an entertaining and insightful perspective into UK athletics. Column entries will be posted twice per week through April. Read Tom’s full biography.With Enes Kanter awaiting an NCAA ruling on his eligibility, that makes it hard to predict what might happen for the University of Kentucky in the men’s basketball season that is about to tip off.But assuming the Turkish big man is able to play for the Wildcats, veteran college basketball writer Mike DeCourcy of The Sporting News believes this UK team has the potential to get as far — or farther — than Calipari’s first Kentucky team. However, he thinks this will be a much different team.”They will have to be much more disruptive defensivley between the midcourt and the foul line than last year’s team was,” DeCourcy told www.tomleachky.com. “Certainly John Wall could control a point guard but that wasn’t the most important element of what they did because once (opponents) got below the foul line, you had to contend with (Patrick) Patterson, (DeMarcus) Cousins, and (Daniel) Orton, and really get beaten up and see shots blocked and (them) grab most of the misses.”I think that this Kentucky team will have to be better at turning over its opponents. They will have to be a physical team in turning turnovers into points. You are so lean on the frontline and don’t have a lot of physical power, so it will be a much different team and I would say that it is almost no comparison, and that includes the holdovers.”Kentucky got a head start on preparing for the upcoming season with 10 days of practice and three exhibition games in Canada during August. DeCourcy said he saw improvement in the players that returned from last season’s 35-3 team.”(Deandre Liggins and Darius Miller) are greatly improved players than over a year ago,” DeCourcy said. “One of the problems last year’s team faced was that the veteran players didn’t beleive in themselves when they needed to and that was in the West Virginia game. I think that the key to this team being successful is those two players that I talked about and believing that they could impact a game, because you can’t just rise up as a freshman when you are not as physically dominant as John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins were.”DeCourcy believes the lack of confidence he observed was a product of the dip in Kentucky’s roundball fortunes that preceded Coach Calipari’s arrival.”I think part of it was that they had never been successful,” DeCourcy said. “Those guys had not been a part of something that worked and now they have. I think they now realize they don’t want to be that guy anymore and I think that is one of the reasons why you see such physical improvment of DeAndre and Darius.  “They really take the challenge of being veteran players. Now, physically, they are there, and confidence-wise, they were there in Canada. That has to continue as they go through the regular season and hit a few bumps and see how they respond. To me, that is the most important element to see where this team goes, other than Enes’ eligibility. I think special players embrace that and I think they both can be impact players.”Freshmen Brandon Knight and Doron Lamb made a big impact in the games UK played in Canada, but we only saw Terrence Jones for a half before he was sidelined by an injury.  DeCourcy said Jones is a dynamic talent that could give the Cats an element that few other teams have.”I think that what he does is gives you one of the most versatile power forwards in the country,” DeCourcy said. “He can handle it and is a terriffic passer. He can handle it from the power-forward spot, which is very rare. He is a very good shooter, not a dead-eye shooter, but can give you about what Patrick Patterson gave you from 3-point range last year. He is going to have to be tough physically, but on offense he will give a dimension that very few teams in the country have in the four spot.”