Two weeks into the season, Kentucky is one of just three teams with a win over a top-10 opponent. To go with that victory against then-No. 8 Baylor, the Wildcats have two more home wins and another on the road against a Central Michigan expected to contend for a conference championship.But for UK Hoops head coach Matthew Mitchell, it’s not all sunshine and rainbows.”We are off to a 4-0 start and it’s good results for us,” Mitchell said, “but we really, really need to get better as a basketball team.”During Thanksgiving week, the ninth-ranked Cats will have ample opportunity to do just that while getting some literal sunshine along the way.Starting on Thursday, UK will play in the Paradise Jam Island Tournament in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands. The Cats left for the U.S. Virgin Islands (forecast 81 degrees and sunny on Thanksgiving Day) early Tuesday morning for a trip where they’ll mix basketball and some tourist activities.First up, UK will face Illinois, off to 4-0 start identical to the Cats’, at 6 p.m. ET on Thursday. Next is 3-0 Oklahoma (receiving votes in the AP Top 25) on Friday at 6 p.m. with USF (3-1) to close it out on Saturday at 8:15 p.m.”Three games against three really quality opponents in three days will be a tough task down in the Virgin Islands,” Mitchell said. “It’s a great trip; it’s a great tournament.”For UK to most effectively capitalize, Mitchell has one thing on his mind above all else.”From a basketball standpoint right now, we are really needing to improve defensively,” Mitchell said. “You can be a good defensive team if you give consistent effort. You’re a great defensive team if you give consistent effort along with consistent fundamentals and technique. We are neither one of those right now.”More than anything else, it was the second half of UK’s win at Central Michigan that had him thinking that way.After a solid first half, the Cats built a lead that ballooned to 20 points with 16:13 left. The Chippewas would chip away from there, missing a would-be game-tying 3-pointer in the final seconds as UK survived, 71-68. CMU shot 44.8 percent from the field in the second half after the Cats held them to 28.6 in the first.”A lot of energy in the first half, a lot of focus in the first half, a lot of disruption,” Mitchell said. “And in the second half, it was very little attention to detail, very little energy defensively.”Mitchell, though he’s demanding improvement, isn’t concerned. Bumps in the road, especially this early in the season, are to be expected. What the Cats can’t do is become satisfied with a little early-season success.”We can’t take the approach of, ‘Well, we beat Baylor and we’re a highly ranked team and so we just show up and take the floor,’ ” Mitchell said. “That’s not our formula. Our formula is being honest with ourselves, working really hard and having some discipline. I think that the players, once they see the visual evidence, they’ll get it corrected.”With that in mind, Mitchell will be looking for a few simple things as he coaches his team this week.”If we do nothing else, we’re just Kentucky tough and Kentucky tenacious and playing together and being the fastest, most disruptive, toughest team we can be in that tournament,” Mitchell said. “If we can accomplish those goals, the technique and the positioning and those kind of mistakes will start to work itself out.”