Winthrop Another Challenge as Cats Pursue Improvement
John Calipari goes to bed at night with his head racing, full of questions to which he needs to find the answers.
Fortunately, he’s normally tired enough from chasing the answers that he’s able to fall asleep anyway.
“I got to make sure I put these guys in the right spot,” Coach Cal said. “I got to make sure – who’s struggling? How do I bring them in? How do I get each individual playing better? How do I make this about this team? How do I get them to understand to be great teammates? How do I not prepare them – game-to-game – prepare them to get better in the process?”
And that doesn’t even account for the added variable of whomever UK’s next opponent happens to be.
“So now, here we’re playing Winthrop,” Calipari said. “And you may say, ‘Winthrop?’ Pat (Kelsey) has done a great job with this team. He’s got seniors. He’s got guards, one’s averaging 20 (points) a game, the other’s averaging whatever. They’re shooting 30 threes a game. We’ve really guarded the three pretty well so far this year.”
At that point in his press conference previewing the matchup with Winthrop Wednesday at 1 p.m., took one of his patented pregnant pauses, looking around the room to make sure assembled media members sensed the sarcasm. It was a timely remark, because No. 10/10 UK (3-1) is fresh off a game in which its opponent, VMI, buried a staggering 19 3-pointers in 38 attempts. On the season, opponents are making 43.4 percent of their 3-point attempts, making UK’s 3-point defense 18th worst in the country.
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| Kentucky vs. Winthrop | ||
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Wed., Nov. 21 – 1 p.m. ET |
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| Coverage | ||
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TV: SEC Network |
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| UK | 2018-19 Stats | WU |
| 85.8 | PPG | 95.2 |
| 79.2 | Opp PPG | 87.2 |
| .479 | FG% | .515 |
| .465 | Opp FG% | .437 |
| 43.2 | RPG | 42.5 |
| .328 | 3PT FG% | .383 |
| .465 | Opp 3PT FG% | .437 |
| .769 | FT% | .758 |
| 14.5 | APG | 15.0 |
| 6.0 | SPG | 5.3 |
| 5.5 | BPG | 4.3 |
“Last game they made some great shots, some nice contested shots and things like that, but that’s not to say that our defense from the 3 can’t improve,” Reid Travis said. “I think that’s one thing that we’ll continue to work on, is closing out on guys the right way, knowing who are the shooters, who we can rotate to better. I think if we just mature as a team and really get our schemes down, I think you’ll see those percentages drop as teams start to go against us.”
That won’t be easy, as Winthrop is an above average 3-point shooting team at 38.3 percent, while UK’s next opponent, Tennessee State, takes more than half its field goals from beyond the arc. That’s been the norm so far this season, as UK’s first four opponents all rank in the top 100 nationally in 3-point shooting.
“You keep drilling it and talking about it but there’s going to be game slippage,” Calipari said. “We talked about it showing the tape. ‘You left? How are we playing this? Why would you do this and not that?’ “
Calipari’s biggest concern on that front is the fact that his players are regularly leaving corner shooters, breaking a cardinal rule for a Calipari defense. That rule, combined with historically sound defense and long, athletic rosters, have made for generally solid work preventing 3-point makes.
Dating back to the 2001-02 season, the first for which kenpom.com has data available, Calipari’s teams have allowed opponents to shoot better than 32.6 percent from 3 on the season just once (2003-04 at Memphis – 35.8 percent). His UK teams have never ranked worse than 97th nationally in the category, with the worst percentage for a season coming in 2015-16 (32.6 percent).
In other words, history is on UK’s side when it comes to the long-term prospects for its 3-point defense. Youth is working against the Cats in the short term.
“You try to push it along, but they’re going to get it on their terms,” Calipari said. “That’s how this stuff goes. Like I tell them in the games, if someone’s not playing well, he’s not playing as much. We’ll deal with you in practice. It’s your responsibility to perform. If you’re playing well, you’re going to play more, that’s just how it is.”
The Cats will have two opportunities to perform in quick succession this week, hosting Tennessee State on Friday with only Thanksgiving Day between that and the Winthrop game.
“Anytime we get to go out there and really just put on display what we’ve been putting in work on in practice, it’s beneficial to us,” Travis said. “So to have these games kind of back to back, it gives us a lot to look forward to. It’s going to help us mature and progress as a team. We’re excited for this week. We’ve put in a lot of work in practice and it’s just another step for us to build on.”
UK will surely show its share of flaws in those two games, but the goal is growth, not perfection.
“This is never easy,” Calipari said. “It’s tiring. Like, it’s tiring, but I don’t think there’s anything I’d rather do than try and prepare a team. Again, for us, our goal every year is that we’re playing our best basketball at the end of the year, you know. Obviously, we have a lot of upside right now.”
Then came another one of those pregnant pauses, filled with the fact that UK has a lot of upside because the Cats have so much work to do.
Veterans Help Kentucky Fend off Sizzling-Hot VMI
Quade Green came off the bench to score a season-high 17 points, including five in the final 90 seconds, to help No. 10 Kentucky hold off VMI and its record-setting 3-point performance, 92-82, on Sunday night.
Leading by 19 midway through the second half, the Wildcats (3-1) had to work to put away the stubborn Keydets, who made 12 second-half 3-pointers and 19 for the game, the most an opponent has ever made agianst Kentucky. Led by Bubba Parham 10 3-pointers, one off the opponent record vs. UK, VMI got within 85-79 with 1:49 remaining. Green answered with a 3-pointer 19 seconds later and Ashton Hagans made a free throw for a 10-point edge.
Tyler Creammer responded with the Keydets’ final 3 to get within 89-82 before Green made two free throws with 33 seconds left. PJ Washington made a free throw with 17 seconds left to seal Kentucky’s third consecutive win.
Reid Travis matched a season high with 22 points for the Wildcats, who won their second game of the Ohio Valley Hardwood Showcase. That total included 10 in the second half while playing with protective glasses after being poked in the eye in the first.
Parham’s 3-point barrage was the bulk of his 35 points for VMI (3-2), who made 19 of 38 from long range. Garrett Gilkeson and Creammer each added 13 for the Keydets.
Veterans Washington, Green and Travis proved to be the difference makers for the Wildcats as they fended off a VMI program that defeated Kentucky the last time it visited Rupp Arena in 2008 for the Wildcats’ season opener.
Washington hauled in a career-high 18 rebounds and produced a double-double with 19 points. Green and Travis combined for 39 points off the bench, with Green’s late heroics being the steady hand UK needed in the clutch. Travis’ 22 points marked the 10th most by a Calipari player off the bench. UK outrebounded the Keydets by 21 and had a 23-3 advantage in second-chance points.
• Only Corey Allmond (11) from Sam Houston State on Nov. 19, 2009 has hit more 3-pointers in a game against Kentucky than Parham
• Parham’s 35 points are the most UK has given up in a game and in Rupp Arena since Texas A&M’s Elston Turner scored 40 on Jan. 12, 2013
• The win marked the 46th consecutive home win over an unranked Associated Press poll nonconference opponent
• Kentucky is now 226-38 under John Calipari against unranked competition
• UK improved to 236-5 (.979) under Calipari when leading by at least 10 points at any point in the game
• Kentucky continues to earn a lot of free throws and is averaging 32.5 attempts per game and making an average of 25. The Cats sunk 29 of 35 (82.9 percent) in Sunday’s win. That’s tied for the ninth-most makes in a single game under Calipari
• It’s the most free-throw makes in a game since hitting 29 against Illinois State on Nov. 30, 2015
• Kentucky outrebounded VMI by a plus-21 margin. UK has outrebounded each of its last three opponents by 21 or more
Ohio Valley Hardwood Showcase
Kentucky’s game vs. Winthrop is the third of four consecutive games the Wildcats will play as a part of the Ohio Valley Hardwood Showcase.
The Ohio Valley Hardwood Showcase is a multi-team event. UK has already played North Dakota (W, 96-58) and VMI (W, 92-82) and will face Tennessee State (Friday), in addition to Wednesday’s matchup vs. Winthrop, as a part of the event.
UK will play all four of its games at Rupp Arena.
Winthrop Poses Problems
Given Kentucky’s defensive struggles this season — the Wildcats are giving up an uncharacteristic 79.2 points per game while allowing opponents to shoot 46.5 percent — the high-scoring Winthrop Eagles could pose problems for UK. Look no further than Southeastern Conference foe Vanderbilt, who Winthrop played closely in the season opener for both teams.
The Eagles return three starters to a team that finished 19-12 and finished second place in the Big South a season ago. Nych Smith, a 5-foot-10 sharpshooter, leads the team averaging 19.3 points per game. He scored a career-high 26 points in Winthrop’s heartbreaking loss to East Tennessee State on Saturday where the Eagles shot 61 percent from the floor and 50 percent form 3-point range in the second half. In the frontcourt, Josh Ferguson is averaging nearly a double-double with 13.5 points and 8.0 boards a game.
Winthrop is averaging 95.2 points per game while shooting 51.5 percent from the floor — not exactly the antidote to UK’s ailing defense right now. UK’s field-goal percentage defense is ranked 295th in the country and its 3-point percentage defense is ranked 343rd.
Cats Cleaning the Glass
Although this Kentucky team isn’t quite as long in the frontcourt as some of John Calipari’s more recent teams, it has rebounded the ball in dominating fashion over the last three games.
UK has corralled 66 offensive rebounds on the season with 55 of those coming over the last three games. Kentucky has snared 18 or more offensive rebounds in each of the last three games.
That rate has propelled the Wildcats to first in KenPom.com’s rankings for offensive rebounding percentage at 51.2 percent. Auburn is the next closest team with a rate of 48.7 percent. The dominance on the offensive glass has enabled the Wildcats to average 18.7 second-chance points and 39.3 points in the paint during its three-game winning streak.
Kentucky is outrebounding its last three opponents by a combined 80 rebounds, an average of a plus-26.7 advantage on the glass per game. It’s the best three-game stretch under Calipari. For the season, UK is plus-79 (19.8 per game).
Five Wildcats are averaging 5.3 rebounds or more per game, but sophomores Nick Richards and PJ Washington have led the domination.
Against Southern Illinois, Richards gobbled up a career-high 19 rebounds — exactly what SIU totaled as a team — to help lift Kentucky to a plus29 margin on the boards. It proved to be a difference maker against a veteran and pesky Saluki squad that led by as many seven midway through the second half. According to Big Blue History, a comprehensive fan website, it’s the first time in school history a UK player has recorded as many rebounds as the opponent.
Richards had nine boards on the offensive end — tied for the most in the Calipari era — and 10 on the defensive end. The 19 total boards were the most by a Wildcat since Michael Kidd-Gilchrist had 19 in a win over Louisville on Dec. 31, 2011.
Washington nearly matched Richards’ feat with a career-high 18 boards in the win over VMI. Washington corralled seven offensive boards and 11 on the defensive end as UK outrebounded the Keydets by a plus-21 margin, resulting in a 23-3 advantage in second-chance points.
It’s the first time since the 2011-12 season that two different Wildcats have hauled in 18 or more in the same season. Kidd-Gilchrist (19 vs. Louisville) and Anthony Davis (18 vs. Chattanooga on Dec. 17, 2011) were the last tandem to turn the trick.
