Notebook: Hawkins Provides Dependability

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – In a time of year synonymous with uncertainty and surprises – it’s called March Madness for a reason, after all – Kentucky head coach John Calipari relishes the idea of stability and dependability.

In senior guard Dominique Hawkins, Calipari has that. His three starting guards have been fantastic throughout the season, averaging a combined 50.0 points, 14.4 rebounds and 8.0 assists per game, but have also all three experienced various ups and downs throughout their rookie campaigns.

When Calipari puts Hawkins in, he knows Hawkins may not score as many points as Malik Monk, grab as many rebounds as Isaiah Briscoe or dish out the same number of assists as De’Aaron Fox, but he does know he’s going to get that energy.

“The greatest thing about Dom: We all know he will play with high energy,” Coach Cal said. “So if you look out there and someone’s not, you’re out.”

In a win-or-go-home setting such as the Southeastern Conference Tournament, where top-seeded Kentucky (26-5) will face No. 8 Georgia (19-13) on Friday at 1 p.m. ET, that dependability is crucial.

After getting off to slow starts and falling behind by 12-plus points in the first half of each of the past three games, Calipari knows his team can play with fire only so many times before it finally gets burned, and while the NCAA Tournament is the tournament that UK cares about more, Coach Cal wants to use the SEC Tournament as a warmup act.

“This is about, how are we getting in a frame of mind of how you’re going to have to play in another week,” Calipari said.

Kentucky was fortunate to just get to an overtime period and then ultimately top Georgia in the two teams’ first meeting on Jan. 31 at Rupp Arena. In the second game, at Georgia, Kentucky’s starting backcourt trio of Fox, Monk and Briscoe combined to hit just 11 of their 37 shots, including 1-of-10 3-pointers, and had nine turnovers to 12 assists.

But there was Hawkins, “Old Reliable,” as Coach Cal likes to call him, who came off the bench to score nine points on 3-of-5 shooting and steal two passes in 21 minutes, giving UK the spark it needed to make a late push and get a five-point win.

“The guy that won the game for us was Dom,” Calipari said. “The way he played, how he changed the complexion of the game and the things that he did.”

How does one defend guard J.J. Frazier? It’s a tough question a number of coaches throughout the SEC have asked themselves. Next up will be Coach Cal on Friday.

“He’s a good player,” Calipari said. “I mean, you look at our league, he’s one of the best in the league.”

The 5-foot-10 All-SEC First Team selection is averaging 18.6 points, 3.8 rebounds and 4.2 assists per game. He scored 17 points and grabbed a season-high 10 rebounds against the Volunteers on Thursday, and has averaged 26.4 points per game over the Bulldogs’ last eight games.

Kentucky struggled to contain Frazier in the two teams’ first two meetings, allowing the speedy guard to score 23 points and knock down three 3-pointers in the first game, followed by a season-high 36 points in game No. 2.

“He gets to his left hand and because of his size he really accelerates on layups,” Calipari said of Frazier. “In other words, he’s not slowing down. He accelerates and lofts that ball up and it’s a hard thing for a big guy to guard when you’re trying to move your feet to stay in front.

“The other thing is he can shoot that 3 behind it, so you go under or let’s do this, it’s a hard thing.”

Coach Cal has said repeatedly over the past week that he’s in a great frame of mind with his team and his goal now is to get his team on that same path. The Wildcats enter the SEC Tournament riding a season-high eight-game winning streak, but Coach Cal is still tweaking.

His vision is a cohesive team that’s patient on one hand, but attacking on the other, that’s aggressive and making things happen. Kentucky has shown that it has the ability to play with each of those qualities, but has not done so for 40 minutes yet.

That’s the next step.

“I would say every one of my teams, none of them reached their full potential,” Coach Cal said. “But what you’re doing as a coach is you’re striving for it. And if they’re striving to be better, then at the end of the day when the season ended you got them as far as they could go at that point.”

Calipari knows he will only have some of his star freshmen for one season. If he had those players longer the development and pursuit of that peak could maybe be reached, but for a perfectionist like Calipari, that may not be attainable in reality.

“You’re trying to just keep them on that path of growing and this team is,” Calipari said. “I look at each individual player, they’re playing better than they have ever here. Basically, that means they’re playing better than they have in their career. … But every year you’re looking, you want to be your best all season at that time and this team is starting to get there. Are they where they need to be? I probably would say I never would be satisfied.”