Kentucky Women’s Basketball Postgame Notes
No. 16/15 Kentucky vs. Vanderbilt
Memorial Coliseum – Lexington, Ky.
Thursday, January 3, 2019
No. 16/15 Kentucky 77, Vanderbilt 55 – FINAL
Team Records and Series Notes
- Kentucky moves to 14-1 on the season while Vanderbilt is now 5-9.
- The Wildcats will return to action Sunday at No. 6/7 Mississippi State at 5 p.m. ET in Starkville, Miss.. The game will be televised on the SEC Network while Darren Headrick will have the call on radio on the UK Sports Network.
- Thursday’s game concluded a five-game home stretch for the Wildcats.
- Vanderbilt leads the all-time series in games played against Kentucky 28-25.
- UK leads the series in games played in Lexington, 13-11.
- The Wildcats have won 12 of the last 14 meetings while Matthew Mitchell is 13-5 all-time against Vanderbilt.
- UK is now 812-533 all-time in program history.
- Matthew Mitchell is in his 12th year with the Wildcats and holds a 270-118 record. Mitchell is 300-147 overall in 14 years as a head coach.
- This was Coach Mitchell’s 300th career win as a head coach.
- The Wildcats hold a 449-156 all-time record in Memorial Coliseum, including a 158-27 mark under Coach Mitchell.
- UK is 18-19 all-time in SEC openers, including 24-13 in SEC home openers.
- Kentucky is 9-3 in SEC openers under Matthew Mitchell.
- Kentucky is ranked No. 16 in the Associated Press Top 25 and No. 15 in the USA Today/Coaches Top 25.
- Kentucky’s 14-1 start is the second best under Mitchell. The Wildcats started 18-1 in 2012-13.
Team Notes
- Kentucky used the starting combination of senior guard Taylor Murray, senior guard Maci Morris, freshman guard Rhyne Howard, sophomore forward KeKe McKinney and sophomore forward Tatyana Wyatt.
- Kentucky is now 13-1 this season with this starting combination.
- The Wildcats grabbed an eight-point lead early in the game forcing a Vanderbilt time out with 6:03 to go in the first quarter. The Commodores would come out of the break on a 9-2 run to cut UK’s lead to one but Kentucky scored five straight points to end the quarter to grab a 21-15 lead at the end of the first quarter.
- Kentucky started the second quarter with an 11-4 run to grab its biggest lead of the game at 32-19 with 5:45 left in the first half.
- Overall, after Vanderbilt had cut the lead to one Kentucky finished the first half on a 24-9 run to take a 16-point lead into halftime.
- Both teams shot over 50 percent from the field in the first half with UK going 15-for-29 from the field, while Vanderbilt went 9-of-17. The Wildcats went 4-of-12 from 3 in the first half while Vanderbilt was 0-for-1.
- UK forced Vandy into 16 turnovers in the first half and scored 16 points off those miscues.
- Kentucky has scored 40 or more points in the first half of four of its last five games.
- Kentucky forced Vanderbilt into a season-high 29 turnovers and scored 30 points off those miscues.
- UK won the second-chance point battle, 12-4, and had a 27-8 edge in bench points.
- Kentucky limited Vanderbilt to just nine points in the second quarter, which was 18th time this season UK has held an opponent to 10 points or less in a quarter.
- UK scored 20 or more points in two quarters during the game and have now scored 20 or more points in 33 of its 60 quarters played this season.
Player Notes
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Senior guard Maci Morris scored 14 points on 5-of-10 shooting including four 3-pointers.
- Morris now has 1,448 career points, which ranks 14th most in program history. She needs one more point to tie Jennifer O’Neill for 13th all-time in school history in points scored.
- Morris has 218 career 3-pointers made which ranks second in program history. She needs 53 more 3s to tie Sara Potts for most all-time.
- Morris has hit at least one 3-pointer in 28 straight games.
- Senior guard Taylor Murray scored seven points with five rebounds and five assists in the game.
- Murray now has 1,165 career points and ranks 26th all-time in points scored. She needs five more points to tie Jocelyn Mills for 25th all-time.
- Murray has 390 career assists which ranks ninth most in program history. She needs 110 more to tie Rita Adams for eighth.
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Freshman guard Rhyne Howard scored 16 points with four rebounds and seven assists.
- Howard had led Kentucky in scoring eight times this season.
- Howard’s seven assists were a career high and she has led UK in assists twice this season.
- This was the 11th time this season that Howard has scored 15 or more points in a game.
- Junior guard Jaida Roper scored eight points with five assists.
- Freshman guard Blair Green scored nine points with two rebounds and two steals in the second half.
- Sophomore forward KeKe McKinney scored nine points with three rebounds.