UK improves to 17-1, 3-0 in the conference as UK takes down the Vols 65-62. UK has now already tied their SEC road wins from last season.
It wasn’t look good early as UK found themselves down 34-26 at the half, UK shooting 0-2 from three, Lamb 0-3 from the field. Cats had 5 of their top 6 guys with 2 fouls.
Cats come up with some great defensive stops at the end to seal the deal. If you are a UT fan you are looking at the quick turnaround from playing @Miss. St just two days ago. If you are a UK fan (which you, or why are you reading this) you give props to UK’s just will to win. When you have two teams that both want it, my money is on the team with the most talent and that is what went down today.
Score was tied 54 all at the 6:59 mark. Vols did not score again until the three by Mustache McBee with 0:39 left in the game. That stretch of defense was the difference in the ball game.
The refs were not at their best in this game, at least in some key plays. When it comes to if refs were ok or not (they are never better than ok as we know) two factors come into my mind.
1) Did we win? Yes, so they so past that test. 2) What they do in big key moments. I would give them a D/F on that one. The technical across the court from the ref? Really? Unless Cal flicked him off or threw something at him, I can’t imagine how the ref makes that call. My guess is he walked over mad at Cal and unless Cal sat down and smiled he was getting t’d. Then Jones 5th foul was so bad…(how bad was it???) so bad that the announcers called the refs out. Jones was clearly fouled and then they called it on Jones to put you out of the game. Luckily that didn’t come back to haunt us.
Fellow Cal’s Cats member noted that the ref Roger Ayer who T’d up Cal was one of the refs who watched WKU get beat against 6 players. How in the world a ref doesn’t get suspended for that but reffing a big game like this? At least keep them in the mid-major if you can’t even count past 5…seriously?
He also noted that Ayers has called 9 UK games, called 3 technicals all on UK. 2 were on Cal.
He is the same ref who called Jones for the 5th phantom foul after missing Jones being fouled. This guy needs to be banned from SEC games or he may cost us a game.
According to Matt Jones, Ayers was refing a game in Tampa Florida late last night before flying up to Knoxville.
Another issue to debate is over Jarnell Stokes. He was recruited by UK but UK did not have a scholarship to offer him. He could have paid his own way for a semester but went with a team that did have an open scholarship in UT.
The interesting note is why UK didn’t have a scholarship. 1) Poole deciding to not leave until after he held the scholarship for a year. Once he took the scholarship, it cannot be given to someone else even if Poole never played one minute for UK this season.
2) Polson was given the extra scholarship and this also can not be given to someone else once Polson took it for a year.
There is no guarantee that Stokes would have chosen UK if the scholarship was open but it does raise a few questions. Should players like Poole who never played one minute count as a scholarship player? Also to debate, should Cal give his extra scholarships to walk ons that prevents any midyear additions?
All I know is Stokes looks good and it would have been nice to have him on our team, especially for next year.
Stats from the game:
UK shot 21-49 (42.9%) from the field, only 2-5 (40%) from three, bright side being we were 2-3 from behind the arc in the 2nd half. 21-29 (72.4%) from the line.
UT had lower stats in all of these categories except they made more threes 6-17 (35.3%) but that is a lower percentage.
We won the rebound battle 33-29. We had 8 blocks to their 5. UT had two more turnovers than us 15-13. They also fouled three more times 22-19 (despite this, no one for UT fouled out).
Anthony Davis led all scorers with 18 (Tatum had 16 for UT). The biggest stat to note for Davis is he broke Magloire’s freshman record. He needed 2 blocks today to do that. He needed 5 to tie Turpin and Riddick for most in one season. He had 4 blocks today, to find himself only 1 block away from tying it.
Other UK scorers:
Kidd-Gilchrist-17 (double-double with 12 rebounds), Teague-7, Jones-10, Wiltjer-5, Miller-4, and Lamb-4. Miller and Lamb need to step it up.
Kidd-Gilchrist after the game:
(on the last 6 minutes) Just be aggressive at all times, rebound the basketball. Make big plays.
I want to be a leader. My team needed me and I stepped up.
(On Stokes) He’s something special. He is going to be great here.
(On the pressure) I’m so young but I don’t care.
We are a young team; we are getting better each and every day. That is what I like about this team.
Cal after the game:
The game was physical again and we weren’t up for the challenge in the 1st half. You got to have pride. That is the bottom line.
What I did like is the fight in the 2nd half from our young kids, all three of them fought their brains out.
Gilchrist made a big threes, came up with 2 boards and made a big free throw. He did great stuff.
The other great shot was the big shot by Davis at the end of the shot clock. He has never done that before and his building his confidence.
They all getting better but they have to talk more and get more physical. We will not be something special if we do not get more physical and it isn’t coming from the young kids.
You have to have pride that you are not going to let the other guy out work you. Make the guy match your intensity, and then he is chasing you now. It is hard but if you want to do something special. Nothing is easy. If it is something special, it is hard to get. It is the way it is.
Wiltjer is big for us, scored 5 points with a 3. When he went to the line, we know he is hitting those shots.
If we do not get more physical, the better teams will beat us. There is nothing I can do.
If this team continues to get tougher, there aren’t a whole lot of teams that will beat us out there, it’s that simple.
To go on the road and win, how big is that? And thank you to our fans, how many UK fans were here? Unbelievable. (On the Go Big Blue chants during the game) that was incredible.
Cats now come back home to face Arkansas on Tuesday January 17th at 9 eastern. The Razorbacks are currently 12-4, 1-1 in the SEC, with a win over MSU at home and a loss to Ole Miss on the road. They play LSU at home tonight.
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