For nine days, UK fans have had to live life without watching their beloved (and top-ranked) Wildcats.The players, meanwhile, surely enjoyed a breather with no classes and no games for almost a week-and-a-half, right?Wrong.”It hasn’t been a break,” Tyler Ulis said.Instead, the Cats (13-0) have endured the rigors of “Camp Cal” leading up to their Southeastern Conference opener vs. Ole Miss (9-4) at 7 p.m. ET on Tuesday. John Calipari has happily filled his team’s would-be free time.”They can’t wait for us to go back to school,” Calipari said in a video on CoachCal.com. “I can’t do three-a-days if they’re going to class.”Coach Cal has been demanding, but he’s not the only one doing the pushing.A pair of guards – Tyler Ulis and Devin Booker – haven’t allowed their team to take a break either.”The biggest thing those two add to this team is their absolute competitive fire,” Calipari said on Monday’s SEC Coaches’ Teleconference. “Every day in practice, whatever drill, however we scrimmage, they want to win.”Ulis and Booker make up the backcourt of UK’s White platoon. If it looks at times like they have a chemistry developed over years, it’s because they do. The two freshmen first met as eighth graders at the Nike Elite 100 Camp in St. Louis and became camp teammates first and fast friends soon after.”We really liked each other’s game and that was more basketball,” Ulis said. “Once we started talking more and exchanged numbers we just became really cool and decided we’d come to school together.”After more time spent together on camp teams, they would of course follow through and have reaped the benefits since arriving in Lexington over the summer. “Coming to school, first, it made it a lot easier, you know just someone there that you’ve been friends with for a while so you can relate,” Booker said. “We had to adjust to new things together, so I think it brought our brotherhood together even closer than it was.”The two, who call themselves best friends, might have grown tighter since coming to college, but the energy they’ve used to set the tone for UK’s practices has always been there.”When we were on the same team at camp and stuff we were the same way,” Booker said. “We never wanted to lose. We’re just two competitive people. Even when we’re going against each other, even when we’re playing video games, just everything, we’re competitive. I guess it was just something that was instilled in us at a young age and we just use it all the time. Coming here, practice is so competitive and it makes us better every day.”Ulis and Booker developed the mentality separate from one another, but it becomes even stronger when the two are together.”We have an understanding,” said Ulis, who celebrated his 19th birthday on Monday. “We’re both competitive and want to win every time we’re on the court. We feed off each other.”In spite of their team’s unblemished record, that doesn’t mean they actually do win all the time in practice. Going up against Andrew and Aaron Harrison’s Blue platoon every day, that would be impossible.”A few days ago, the White smashed the Blue and then two days ago the Blue absolutely smashed the White,” Calipari said. “They had no chance. That’s how it’s been and if you don’t show (up), then that’s what’s happening.”It should come as no surprise that Ulis took the loss hard, even though it was in a practice.”Tyler made a couple bad plays, turned it over and he apologized. ‘My fault, guys.’ ” Calipari said. “And he was really upset with himself because he wanted to win that scrimmage. That’s why, when you see how hard these kids play, you see them compete in games, it’s because they compete that way in practice. And Devin and Tyler have really driven that part of the culture that we have here.”That culture is why the Cats are in constant search of the next improvement to be made in spite of leading the nation in scoring margin, as well as a score of other defensive statistics.”I feel like we all understand that we need to get better because offensively we know we’re not where we need to be,” Ulis said. “Our defense is very good but we need to execute more, so that’s what we’re working on.”To that end, Coach Cal has implemented a change to the way his guards play that has evoked memories of the “tweak” that preceded UK’s 2014 Final Four run, right down to his evasiveness when asked exactly what it is.”Now there’s a few areas that we’re looking at, like OK let’s now keep these players engaged and get them to focus on a couple areas, which is what we’ve done the last seven, eight days,” Calipari said. “And obviously I’m not talking about those things, but you’ll see them.”Ulis was willing to share a little more information.”He’s just trying to help us draw fouls and not flail into the defenders when we get to the bucket,” Ulis said. “Basically, just helping us all out a little bit, which has helped. It’s changed a lot in practice. We’re actually doing great with the adjustments.”Considering league coaches spent much of Monday’s teleconference talking in reverent tones about how the Cats have established themselves as ahead of the pack in not only the SEC but the nation, that might seem like piling on. But it’s not greed that’s driving UK; it’s that competitive fire.”I think we have to focus on ourselves like Coach stresses to us – to play against ourselves, and you know, whoever’s out there, we’re not playing against them,” Booker said. “We’re playing against ourselves.”