UK fell to Kansas in its NCAA Regional opener on Friday, 10-6. (Britney Howard, UK Athletics)

LOUISVILLE — For the fifth time in Kentucky’s last five NCAA Regional appearances, the Wildcats came out on the wrong side of the scoreboard in the opening game of an NCAA Regional, following UK’s 10-6 loss to Kansas in Louisville Friday night.In a game that saw more than three hours’ worth of weather delays, UK could never find a rhythm in Friday’s matchup with the Jayhawks. Starting pitcher Kyle Cody lasted just one-third of an inning after allowing three runs in the first and then sitting through an hour weather delay.UK head coach Gary Henderson was quick to dismiss the notion that the weather was the cause for his team’s poor play vs. KU.”Kansas had to go through the same thing,” Henderson said. “They played much better than we did today. It’s not ideal to have three delays, but it didn’t affect our pitching in the first two innings. I wouldn’t attribute anything that happened today to delays, lightning, rain, stops, none of it. We just didn’t play well enough.”The 2014 NCAA Tournament marks Kentucky’s eighth trip in program history to the tournament and Kentucky is now 1-7 all-time in the opening game of a regional. However, the Wildcats have shown resilience in bouncing back to make the final game of the regional in five of those appearances, but have not advanced to a Super Regional.The situation facing Kentucky is familiar and not ideal, but one that can be conquered.”It’s hard,” Henderson said. “The bottom line is it’s hard. It’s not impossible. It’ll probably happen this year with somebody. There’s 16 of these (regionals) going on right now, so somebody will probably go through the loser’s bracket and win. It might as well be us.”The Wildcats’ National Player of the Year A.J. Reed doesn’t necessarily view his team as having a huge hill to climb.”I don’t think it’s really a hole,” Reed said. “We’re a good team. We can go win four games in a row; we’ve done it before this season. It all starts with tomorrow, so we have to come out here and play well tomorrow and get a good feel back and get some momentum back. I think after that we’ll get on a little roll.”The junior lefthander will get the start in game two Saturday vs. Kent State in the elimination game. The last time UK and Kent State took the field, the game went 21 innings, while drawing a lot of similarities to today’s game, as both contests lasted more than six hours. Of course the two games were marathons for two different reasons.”I think we just approach it the same way we approach every other game,” Reed said. “Tomorrow’s game is a little more important obviously because it’s an elimination game, but we’re going to come out here with the same energy and enthusiasm that we always do and we’re going to attack the hitters and be aggressive at the plate. We’re going to go out there and play our game.”One game at a time. That has been the theme all week in preparation of the Louisville Regional and though the Wildcats were trying to avoid the loser’s bracket that is where they are once again.”We have one thing in front of us and that’s tomorrow’s ball game,” Henderson said. “That’s it and that’s all we need to be worried about, so we need to do a good job with that. If we’re fortunate enough to play well tomorrow then we can talk about the next game.”

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