‘I’m Not Cracking’: Calipari Resolute in Defeat
John Calipari was adamant, is adamant and will continue to be adamant.
Even after the first three-game losing streak of his tenure at Kentucky, Coach Cal isn’t backing down.
“I’m not cracking,” Coach Cal said. “This doesn’t faze me. I’m not mad at them. They’re young. I’m not frustrated.”
Calipari might have just watched the No. 24/24 Wildcats (17-8, 6-6 Southeastern Conference) lose in disheartening fashion at Texas A&M (17-8, 6-6 SEC), but he’s remaining resolute. He knows his team shares his overriding goal – reaching its potential – so he’s not about to back off.
“A big part of it is they have to want stuff to happen,” Calipari said. “I believe they do. I believe they’re embarrassed by their play. If I didn’t—I told them, ‘If I want this worse than you want this, please tell me so I can start taking my wife to movies and dinners.’ But they want this. They want it for each other. It’s just it’s a tough deal.”
It was certainly tough in Reed Arena on Saturday, as the Aggies thrilled a fired-up home crowd by scoring 59 points and shooting 20 of 30 (66.7 percent) from the field in the second half. That stood in stark contrast to a first half that saw UK close on an 8-0 run to take a four-point lead into halftime.
“We did a really great job in the first half, holding them to only 26 points,” said Kevin Knox, who had 18 points. “Then the second half, I don’t know. They just came out—I think they shot 70 percent, he said, in the second half. That’s crazy. That’s a really good number. You can’t win any games with teams shooting 70 percent. We just had a lot of defensive lapses, no communication in the second half, gave up some second-chance points, wide-open shots. Next thing you know, we would be down 15.”
A&M exploded for a 26-6 run in the first seven-plus minutes of the second half. UK managed to claw back to within eight points in the final minute after trailing by as many as 23, but for most of the second half Shai Gilgeous-Alexander – who finished with 19 points and eight assists – was the only Cat not falling victim to the vicious cycle of self-driven thought and play.
“What it becomes is, why is it happening?” Calipari said of UK’s repeated lapses this season. “Again, you’re so into how you’re playing you can’t give that energy to the team. That’s what young guys do and I can’t seem to get them over that hump. They’re more concerned about how they’re playing and then when they’re concerned they look really bad individually.”
That sort of play, combined with an SEC deeper and better than it’s been in years is what leads to a three-game skid.
“There’s not enough trust there yet,” Calipari said. “And it’s not just one guy. We got a bunch of guys that, you know, not doing the stuff that we need. Look, this league is unbelievable. It’s a heck of a league. I think we’re probably—our strength of schedule’s probably five or six in the country and I imagine even after this game our RPI is probably 14, 15, 16. And we’re—’Kentucky! Cal’s gonna go—’ No, no. We just gotta get a game where we put two halves together and let the winning take care of itself and we’ll go from there.”
Twenty minutes in, Calipari thought UK’s breakthrough might be in progress against an A&M team playing like the group that was ranked as high as No. 5 in December. Since it didn’t, it’s back to work, though he does admit the time for urgency is here.
“We still got time,” Calipari said. “I’ve been in this situation a couple different times at Kentucky and you know every team we play is giving us their best shot. So when we get this, we’ll bust through, but it’s getting old right now. Each week that goes by, it gets harder and harder to get this thing to where you want it to go.”
To get that to happen, Calipari knows he needs a leader from among his team to step up to lift his team.
“Right now, I’m not sure we have that guy,” Calipari said. “The reason is it’s hard to talk when you’re not playing well. It’s hard to talk when you’re saying the guy won’t fight until the game’s down 14. Then it’s hard to be that guy to say anything in those meetings.”
It hasn’t happened yet, but Calipari is going to keep chipping away until it does.
“I’m not cracking,” Calipari said. “I’ve coached 30 years and all I’m thinking about is how do I get these guys to play two halves the way they played the first half.”
