Nobody would have blamed A’dia Mathies for feeling a little buyer’s remorse after she signed
with the University of Kentucky in late 2008.Shortly after inking with Kentucky, Louisville, the other school on Mathies’ short list of schools to attend, made an unlikely run to the 2009 national championship against superpower Connecticut. Upon watching the Cardinals storm to the national spotlight, several of Mathies’ friends and family nudged her and asked her why she chose Kentucky, a program seemingly stuck in neutral, over one that, by all appearances, had just broken through.A couple of years later, things have gone in two different directions for the Bluegrass’ top two schools. Louisville is trying re-establish itself on the national scene after missing the NCAA Tournament last year while Kentucky is enjoying one of its best runs in program annals. Mathies, a Louisville, Ky., native, has insisted she never had any doubts as to where she wanted to go to school, but she has taken UK’s recent success as an opportunity to poke back of some of her Louisville friends and family members and tell them, “I told you so.””I do sometimes,” Mathies said when asked if she reminds some of her pro-Louisville friends that she made the right choice. “They’re still Louisville fans regardless of how far we went, but they still support me, too.”Plenty of Mathies’ supporters, some in red and some in blue, will be in the house Sunday at 2 p.m. in Louisville’s newly christened KFC Yum! Center for the annual rivalry. Mathies isn’t exactly sure how many family and friends will be in attendance in for her hometown return, but she’s expecting enough that she started asking for some of her teammates’ tickets a month ago.”There are a lot of people telling me, ‘I’m coming, I’m bringing some friends with me,’ ” Mathies said. “A whole lot of alumni, a whole lot of my family, my best friends (say they’re coming), so I don’t really know what kind of number to expect. I expect a lot of them to be out there.”Though she’s just a sophomore, Mathies has been through the homecoming before. Last year, in one of Mathies’ first career games in front of a near packed house at Memorial Coliseum, Mathies passed the first test against her hometown Cardinals with 15 points in 28 minutes. The 5-foot-9 guard returned to the Derby City during UK’s magical Elite Eight run as well, playing first- and second-round NCAA Tournament games in Freedom Hall.”I’m kind of used to it now since I’ve played there two games, but it’s definitely not the same,” said Mathies, who leads Kentucky with a 16.0 scoring average. “That was the NCAA Tournament. This is a big rivalry.”A rivalry Mathies knows all too well.  As a Louisville native, she’s watched the series go back and forth. Kentucky has a decisive 29-17 edge, but the Cards had owned the series recently until the Cats snapped a five-game losing streak with a 101-67 drubbing last year. Head coach Matthew Mitchell doesn’t know if Louisville will have a chip on its shoulder after last year’s beating, but he did caution his team and reporters from putting too much stock into last season’s game.”I don’t know the impact of last year’s game on this because it can turn so quickly,” Mitchell said. “We were beaten very badly the year before over in Louisville so I’m not sure how much that beating there had a lot to do with what we did here. Louisville is a totally different team and I think we are a different team. We’ll find out Sunday where everything shakes out.”One thing Mitchell would concede is that last year’s Louisville game was one of the initial turning points for the program. Kentucky was 9-0 heading into last year’s annual rivalry game and in search of the program’s best start, but the Cats had hardly been tested.Against the Cards, Kentucky validated its early season success by forcing a devastating 38 turnovers.”It was a very important game for us last season, and when I think back to that game, I was very impressed that what we had worked in practice and all the things we had talked to the kids about got to the floor,” Mitchell said. “That was the first evidence that possibly we were on to something last year because they executed so well in that game.”Kentucky has continued to rely on its turnover-driven defense and high-pace offense this year en route to a 5-0 start. Despite a slew of injuries and several freshman additions, the Cats are leading the nation in turnover margin with a plus-11.6 clip.”I had no idea we were leading in turnover margin,” Mitchell said. “The one thing that has surprised me is that we haven’t turned the ball over that much. Maegan Conwright has made great decisions. I don’t think she had a turnover during the Notre Dame game; she had three assists and no turnovers. That is remarkable to me that those kids can function in that manner. “Also, we don’t have a ton of live-ball turnovers. Ours have been charges or three seconds in the lane and things like that so our ball handling has been OK. That’s been the most surprising thing in that the athleticism we possess and some of the opponents we’ve played, they can just speed people up and make them turn the basketball over.”Now that Kentucky has landed on the national radar, Mathies and senior forward Victoria Dunlap have noticed teams try to slow down their frantic pace. Louisville has shown the ability to get up and down the floor with teams, but Mitchell expects Sunday to be a defensive struggle because of Louisville’s different defensive sets.”They give you so many different looks that it will be interesting to see what one comes out on top,” Mitchell said. “The big concern for me is being able to communicate in that environment. They have such an ability to make you look bad at times because they do such a good job with their traps and rotations. Can you keep your team encouraged if they go through back-to-back poor plays? Or if the ball is stolen two or three times in a row, can you stay encouraged and not get demoralized?”If there is one thing the Kentucky players have demonstrated this season, it’s that they can play through adverse situations.Three key pieces, Keyla Snowden, Samantha Drake and reigning Southeastern Conference Player of the Year Victoria Dunlap, have already missed time with injuries in addition to the preseason loss of starting point guard Amber Smith. Dunlap, who suffered a concussion in last week’s Lady Eagles Thanksgiving Class, is expected to play Sunday, but even so, UK hardly missed a beat without her because of Mathies’ recent play.After struggling to find the bottom of the net in the win over No. 12 Notre Dame, Mathies has hit 11 of her last 22 shots. For the year, she’s 22-of-44 from the floor and finding her stroke in perfect time for her much-anticipated homecoming.”I’ve been looking at (the rivalry) all my life ever since I was little,” Mathies said. “Football, basketball, baseball and everything else, it’s a big game and I’m looking forward to playing in it.”