Sahvir Wheeler had 12 points and was happy UK won but coach John Calipari said Wheeler's eight turnovers were partly his fault. (UK Athletics Photo)
For the first time in the John Calipari era, the Cats shot worse than 40 percent from the field, worse than 25 percent from 3-point range, and committed at least 15 turnovers in a true road game — and UK still won. But as historic as those numbers might be, there was also one other first — or at least close to a first.
Kentucky coach John Calipari blamed himself for not having point guard Sahvir Wheeler prepared to face the aggressive Texas A&M defense that forced him into eight turnovers. The Aggies gave Wheeler nowhere to go with the ball and often he panicked with a bad decision, especially in the first half.
“First of all I did a really bad job in the pick-and-roll stuff for Sahvir and made him look bad,” Calipari said.
That’s how the UK coach started his postgame press conference in response to a question about UK’s late-game execution. Clearly, he knew Wheeler was being blasted by Kentucky fans and wanted to take the blame off him because the Cats did not look prepared for what Texas A&M did.
“We have got to be better prepared,” Calipari said.
The coach did say he had tried to “take him through” some scenarios but had to do a better job making sure he understood what to do. LSU had seemed to come out with the same type of game plan but Wheeler was hurt so early in the game it didn’t matter. In the loss at LSU, Notre Dame took the opposite approach and just backed off Wheeler.
However, Jacob Toppin said UK did adjust after getting behind by 13 points. The Cats outscored Texas A&M 34-23 in the second half.
“I mean they were trapping him as soon as he stepped over half court, so it was very hard for him to get around it because they had very athletic guards, athletic wings who can stay in front,” Toppinn said. “So we just figured if we get the ball to the wings or to the middle that we could just play aggressive there.
“That’s what we did in the second half. In the first half, they really got us there but we changed that in the second half.”
Guard Davion Mintz said Texas A&M “dislodged” UK early.
“They were way more aggressive than we expected. They had us out of rhythm,” Mintz said. “But I am proud of us coming out with a win regardless of how ugly it was.”
Calipari agreed but he also emphasized a big part of the ugliness was due to his preparation.
“I got to do a better job. If they are going to bum rush our pick and rolls, here is how we are playing and that’s on me. That puts us in a hole right away,” Calipari said.
“And even if they come and trap, we had some things we were doing. This was more of a bum rush. This was literally hands on you and clothes and bodies.”
“I got to do a better job with that for these kids so that they’re not confused because when you’re confused you cannot be aggressive. And I want us flying and being aggressive.”
7 Responses
But i will give credit to Cal for putting fresh bodies in through out the game. I thought we kind of wear them down in the last 6.00 minutes or so with our defense.
Very true, but its much easier to sub, when kids are turning the ball over like we were last night. I did not look, but they turned it over quiet a bit all so. Just glad we got out of there with the win. Not taking any thing away from cal or this fun team, these kind of games just prepare you much better for the big dance.
When you are getting double teamed some one is open, Wheeler is so short and is so use to dribbling the ball through people he did not adjust. And they were were very good at trapping him. I thought Ty Ty should have taken over the point long before he did.
But we will take the ugly win over an uglier loss any day of the week. Ty Ty is just cooler under pressure the Wheeler, and much taller to see that open man.
Go Cats
Very impressive win by the Cats in a tough environment (saw some Blue scattered throughout) and the Aggies came ready. Their Center who transferred in from Duke matched up as good as anyone this season vs. Oscar. A big factor was the HOME team gong only 1 for 22 from three on their HOME court !
Excuse me, but this is the middle of January. We are in conference play. Coach, please don’t tell us that you have not practiced against full court presses. Sometimes, I have to think that you do just roll the balls on the court and let the kids do as they wish. We can expect the same pressure from Auburn, M State, and Kansas to finish up the month. I think you should have gone from College Station on to Auburn so you could have gotten in a couple of practices. Missing a couple of days of classes would have been ok as they could hit the books in between practices. There is not much else to do in Auburn. Bruce Pearl knocked you out of a Final Four and plans to give you a good whooping on Saturday. Getting beat by a better team is understandable, but losing because you were not prepared to play is totally unacceptable. Let’s not have any more of this talk unless you are planning to call it quits after the season.
Whodat: dumbass
Bram you forgot to ask me if I wanted fries with that.