Hard to Win on the Road

[CatPhight]

Kentucky won the SEC regular season championship by three games in 2020 -that’s four years ago -and completed a string of four straight tournament wins in 2018 - that was five tournaments ago, not counting the year UK was the 1 seed and it was canceled. Weird to be a Kentucky fan but constantly underplaying the program’s history and accomplishments.

 

[St.PatterSoN-54-]

So you are saying if Dillingham, Sheppard, and Reeves are not giving the effort on the defensive end, you bench them ? Who plays ? Watkins ? Hart ? LOL, you could maybe do that in the 80/90s, but today ? Right. I would love to read the comments on here about Cal if he benched his top scorers because they didn't give the effort on defense. Bobby Knight is NOT coaching today, that would not fly. When you have scorers like we do this year, you just have to suck it up, stick with them and hope they make SOME defensive plays. If we benched our bad defensive guys, we would have players in the game who are not that much better at the end, but can't score a lick.

My last post going back and forth on this, it is just a waste of time, you see things one way (Blame Cal for it all), I see it another. (players are part to blame, and 100% to blame on effort given.)

Yes. I would absolutely bench any players to prove my point. Until they were ready to play defense. So would Pitino. So would most other coaches. But keep going Ellen, the brownies are done soon….

 

[hotelblue]

People are underestimating the effect of Wagner being out for several games, of NONE of the 7-footers playing much until well into January and even of Mitchell going down when he was arguably the most important player on the team at that time.

To cite just one thing: The way Z runs the floor at 7-foot-plus and pressures interior defenders to account for him has opened up the seams in defenses like a fat girl in size 1 yoga pants. It has given space for Dillingham especially to make plays but also Reeves and Sheppard. Had Z been available to play from November, this team would have been completely different.

This is a team that would be on the cusp of a #1 seed if it had been close to healthy all year, and clearly has Final Four caliber talent. I think Saturday will show that and cause a bit of a reassessment among Kentucky fans (and a swift dash to the hideouts for the obvious trolls we have here.)

i agree, and although i am ready for the cal era to come to an end i haven’t quite as much to say about his coaching this year because of what you mentioned. there’s still situational issues and defensive blunders, but the fact is, if healthy, we’d have been top 10 all year, probably top 5. and that would have made me a bit quieter.

one thing cal has done well has been managing our centers. that they all came back around the same time, i figured, would have presented ongoing problems. there have been a couple times where he stayed with one guy too long in a game, but overall once ugo and big z showed themselves, the experimenting with bradshaw ended and we have a real dynamic down low, and it’s game to game. that, plus maybe trey getting somewhat back to form presents a major scouting issue for the opposition.

 

[ArtLaibsGhost]

We should blow tenn. out say Barnes sits all his starters out to get ready for tournament run

Will NOT happen, they win they are pretty much assured a 1 seed no matter what they do in SEC tournament. It's as big a game for them as it is us