It may have been an early day game but it was all Knight today! Cats take down Bob Huggins and his W.Virginia Mountaineers 71-63 to improve to the Sweet 16. Cats improve to 27-8.
Huggins 8-1 record against Cal is now 8-2. UK improves to 2-1 against Big East schools.
This game can be summed up as a frustrating end to the 1st half after finding themselves down 8 after having the game what seemed to be in our control, and then the refs killed us in the last 3-4 minute stretch before halftime. It’s always frustrating when your team is down but when the refs have a big part on it, it’s even worse. Personally find the “we are getting robbed” feeling to be far worse than the “man we just suck today” feeling.
Then the Cats took a quick run in the 1st half to tie it up and eventually take the lead after Jones shot a horrible air ball shot but thankfully Harrellson was there for the put back to take the lead. Does that shot by Jones count as an assist??? That shot reminded me of Wall’s shot in the SEC championship last year before Cousins put it back. Of course Wall had a reason to be shooting that shot…
WVU rallied back, getting the lead back and then brought their lead to 55-51. At this point the Cats took charge and finished the game on a 20-8 run. Cats stepped on d and held WVU to only 22 second half points. That’s either much better defense or bad WVU offense…
Thankfully the refs seemed to call a more equal second half. Of course I’m sure WVU would argue differently…
This is the third time in the row, UK has been down at the half and have come back to win it.
Brandon Knight bounced back from a rough Princeton game (outside of his clutch game winner) with a career high 30 points. You could say it was a Knight and day difference.
Knight becomes the 3rd member of this freshman class to go for 30 or more in a game this season. Jones put up 35 against Auburn, Lamb put up 32 against Winthrop.
Things may change but as this point Jones and Knight are both saying they are coming back next year. Lamb actually wants to go pro more than Knight and Jones do if he was projected to be 1st round. He has a lot of work to do, to be 1st round material. So the good news is, if Lamb does leave, this means we had a really good tournament…
Can you imagine everyone coming back other than Harrellson along with what we are coming in??? Wow.
Harrellson with another big game with 15 points, 8 rebounds, 1 steal, 1 block, 7-10 from the field.
Other scorers: Jones with a quiet 12 (6 coming from the line), Lamb-6, Miller-3, Liggins-3, and Vargas with 2.
Lamb and Miller struggled today but thanks to Knight and Harrellson we survived without their A games.
I will say for Jones, he is forcing the ball a whole lot less. At times this year, Jones played selfish, just trying to get his. He seems to be growing up. There was one play, Jones was still scoreless and was working the ball inside, nothing was there and instead of forcing the shot, he kicked it out for a three that was nailed. Glad to see Jones playing smart even if it means not scoring.
What’s tough about preparing for UK is the simple fact, no one know who will go off. Miller? Knight? Lamb? You just never know with these Cats.
Cats shot 24-50 (48%) from the field, 6-18(33.3%) from three, 17-24(70.8%) from the line.
WVU shot 22-53(41.5%) from the field, 7-19(36.8%) from three, 12-16(75%) from the line.
WVU had three players score in double figures: Mazzulla-20, Bryant-15, and Mitchell-11.
Cats who were getting beat in the rebound category at the half ended up winning the boards 34-29. I found it odd, how many times UK sent no one to crash the boards on offense 1st half. It was a one and done with no fight over and over. We crashed more in the 2nd half, picking up multiple key offensive rebounds.
WVU had 11 turnovers to our 10. This was one area Knight struggled with at times, as he had 4 turnovers, which is high for him.
Liggins after the game: I was up all night, just thinking about this game. I was thinking about how last year they beat us and I wanted to get revenge.
I wasn’t able to do well in the 1st half and was able to come back in the 2nd half. Knight played a great game for us.
At halftime Cal just told us to come out and perform better and we did. I bring a lot of tangibles to this team. This team has a lot of scorers; they don’t know need my scoring.
Cal: Huggins confused our guys at first with their odd jump zone, I don’t know exactly what that was but we adjusted. It was a heck of a game and a heck of a win for our program. As for Knight’s Princeton’s shot: rather he is 0-8 or not, the ball is in his hands. He’s the best point guard in the country.
We had a bad ending to the half, didn’t block out, didn’t come up with the lose ball which led to the foul.
We down three or four baskets and now we want to know if you are tough enough to get it done and we were.
The biggest play of the game was Harrellson rebound and a stick back with a foul.
Robic after the game: We did a good job offensively in the 1st half but we had to adjust our defense.
We came up with every loose ball and every tough rebound. WVU is a very good rebounding team and our big guys neutralized this well.
We did better at execution in the 2nd half.
Knight came out and hit those 1st two threes coming off a subpar game for him. Knights a scorer and that is what he is going to do and we wanted him to be aggressive and he did that.
As this season gets deeper and deeper, our execution is getting bigger and bigger. At the half we told them to lay it on the line, you have 20 minutes to get it done.
Cats now will face the winner of George Mason and Ohio St. next Thursday March 24th in Newark. The time has not yet been set. George Mason and Ohio St play tomorrow at 5:15 eastern.
Go Cats! Take care of business in Newark!
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