I think the majority of fans have struck a good balance after this win of being pumped and happy about knocking off a top 5 team on the road who is one of our bigger rivals and realizing at the same time this team still has a long way to go and needs to string together a bunch of performances like this to get more fans fully on board. Cal needs to get his head out of his rear and play Wheeler much less for this team to reach its peak.
What it also showed me is that coach shouldn’t have put us in a position to lose some of the games that we have this year. We had no business losing to quite a few of those teams. It’s Cal we’re talking about he’s going back to playing those crazy lineups. He has it in his mind that they work so he’s going to continue to go back to those lineups when those players come back. Cal will always be Cal.
The decision to not have Wheeler was made for him.
We did win. Can't even enjoy a win against one of our biggest rivals. I guess you would have preferred a loss.
Kentucky shot 35% from the floor yesterday and committed 19 TOs. Most of the time, those are not winning stats. We won because we dominated the boards and shot uncharacteristically well from the FT stripe. Tennessee was terrible yesterday and Rick Barnes basically acknowledged as much. Barnes' game plan to rough up Tshiebwe backfired because Oscar hit his FTs and had a strong rebounding game.
Dunno, Cal's post-game was definitely in a cocky tone of showing up the fans that doubted.
This ^ is me. Triple C needs to go asap. He has set us back so far it’s criminal. But …. I’m always going to pull for the ‘players’ and the ‘team’. Especially Oscar. I took great pleasure beating the UT scum, especially on the road. I’m not optimistic about the future with Triple C at the helm but yesterday felt pretty darn good for a change.
Yes, regrettably, it sure sounded like that. Cal is not fond of Kentucky's fan base and seems locked in an "I told you so" fight with the Lexington public. A leopard does not change his spots.
I agree 100%. The only think I’ll add is for the last several years it seems our teams have lacked the lateral quickness to stay in front of their man. If CCC would change his defensive philosophy to help with this problem who knows what could be. But we all know he won’t. His teams always struggle at defending the pick and roll and that holds true this year also.
You might be right about the lack of lateral quickness, but this is just hard for me to believe. It is hard for me to believe because Cal has long been attracted to long athletic players even if they couldn't shoot. The notion that a player can be super athletic with the absence of lateral movement just goes against conventional wisdom, imho. However, I could be wrong.
I have avoided his speaking for quite a while but listened more this year just to see what his mindset is. Dude is just insufferable. After the wins he has had this "see it just takes time to figure things out". The only thing he said yday that was true was that his teams have always been tough and they found that. Then it was on to talking about injuries and showing up his critics.
No, but the big possum hunts at night
I don’t think anyone hates that we won. I have yet to see anyone say it sucks that we did
I guess you forgot about the 26-point loss to Bama, the embarrassing loss at home to South Carolina less than a week ago and the loss to 15 seeded St Pete.
Not only that, but most of the teams we have been losing to, had players that were not as athletic as our guys.
“Don’t steal my joy”. This win was huge if you are a genuine Kentucky fan. The precious present is always important. Of course, this win doesn’t eliminate the future concern about this team’s ability to perform. The team may collapse again. Who knows? We are in the here and now and I now at least have some hope this team can improve to be a contender. Will it happen? I don’t know but for right now Cal is the coach and my team is playing. I’m pulling for them to all be successful. I’m not going to wallow in “gloom despair and agony in me” because CAl is our coach.
The reason UT got some straight line drive baskets, is because Cal designed the defense to focus on taking away the 3 point shot.
Agree 100 percent.The win showed that thru preparation,this team is capable.Yes,I'm still skeptical about the team and Calipari but for this game I am proud of the effort from the players and the coach.
Been saying the same thing for years....has the bar been set so low that we are now happy with one big win? How does this make up for the dismal performance the past several years.?
