John Calipari has to find a way to get Justin Edwards playing better. (Vicky Graff Photo)
Kentucky’s 80-73 loss to UNC-Wilmington Saturday stunned not only UK fans but also coach John Calipari a bit.
However, it was a week where ranked teams went down consistently starting with No. 1 Purdue losing to Northwestern, No. 3 Marquette to Wisconsin, and No. 7 Duke losing to both Arkansas and Georgia Tech. If that is not enough. No. 14 Texas A&M, No. 18 Villanova (twice), No. 21 Mississippi State, and No. 22 Alabama also got upset.
Kentucky fans naturally had some interesting reactions after Saturday’s loss and other teams’ woes didn’t do much to make Big Blue Nation feel better.
“Where did all those smiles, hugs, hi-fives, and one more pass go?! Falling at home to a 17-point underdog will hurt come (NCAA) seeding time .. gotta get that chemistry and loving feeling back!” former UK point guard Roger Harden posted on X.
Former Lexington sports anchor Kenny Rice who went on to work for NBC and other national media outlets, had a subtle jab for both UK basketball and football.
“This mean #UKBasketball fans have to ‘pony up’ cause you know the deep pockets at #UNCWilmington do land all their 4 stars,” Rice tweeted about what UK football coach Mark Stoops said about UK fans needing to “pony up” more money for NIL after his team lost to Georgia.
Former UK player/assistant coach Reggie Hanson had a more practical reaction to the loss.
“A good Veteran team beat a potentially good young team. Simple as that. No excuses. Just got to get in the gym and work. You can’t teach experience. It can only be learned on the job,” Hanson posted and my guess is UK fans agree.
Freshman Justin Edwards had trouble defensively getting beat one-on-one way too often. He was also 4-for-14 from the field, including 0-for-5 from 3. He did have six rebounds, two assists, two steals, and one block in his 32 minutes but just is not playing like a player projected as a top 10 2024 NBA draft pick before the season started.
“Let’s be honest. The ball doesn’t even look that good coming out of Edwards’ hands right now. The misses don’t even appear to be that close,” Justin Rowland of Rivals.com posted.
That brought this reply from WVLK afternoon radio host Larry Glover.
“At this point, he doesn’t look nearly as far along as I was expecting. A long way to go to be attractive enough to tempt a team to pick in the first round,” Glover posted on social media.
WKYT-TV weatherman Chris Bailey never hides his love for UK sports. He was not shy with his reaction to the loss.
“If not for Reed Sheppard, Kentucky may very well have been blown out. This team was not ready to play today and that falls on the shoulders of Coach Cal,” Bailey posted.
Basketball analyst Sean Vinsel of HoopsInsight.com is a statistics guru. He didn’t mince words, either, about UK’s play.
“Massive disappointment for UK to shoot worse on two-pointers than a UNCW team with no size who came in 207th in 2 pt FG %. If you want to pinpoint issues, start there and dig in,” he said.
David Sink, another Rivals.com basketball writer/analyst, was more concerned with UK’s porous defense.
“Doesn’t matter who is out or how young they are. UK has to get past the outscore-the-opponent mentality. Have given up games of 89, 88, 82, & 80 (points) this year through eight contests. This was like a 1st round tourney game. Bad defensive favorite loses to mid-major with good guards,” Sisk posted.
That could bring back nightmares for UK fans of the 2022 NCAA Tournament first-round loss to Saint Peter’s and that certainly was not something most fans ever envisioned thinking about this year after UK’s rout of Miami last week. However, one game can change a lot and now the Cats have to get back to work to answer a lot of these concerns.
16 Responses
It’s not a surprise. They are not kind after a win.
Certain losses simply should never occur at Rupp Arena to any UK team, and this was one of them. Evansville also comes to mind.
The debate always rages following one of these, was it poor preparation by the coaches, or simply a team issue with lack of readiness, ie taking the opponent for granted.
Perhaps it was some of each, but Calipari bears total responsibility.
The loss to UNCW killed our NET ranking which is now 45. UNCW, a 17 point underdog, is a team you should never lose to, especially on your home floor. We have a long way to go with this season, but look for this loss to bite us in the butt when it comes to seedings in the Big Dance.
With the bigs coming back, there will be less minutes for everyone. It will slow the game down and produce fewer shots…Calipari will demand that. That is not going to be received well by so many who plan to move on to the NBA at season’s end. Sheppard has demonstrated that he is the most complete player on the team, but that was not supposed to be the case. Is that what caused the selfish play against the Seahawks?
The team is clearly better with Sheppard on the floor, but that could alter the draft stocks of the 5 star kids who thought they would be the star here. Calipari publicly states that nobody is promised PT, but when it comes to inking a 5 star kid, who knows? Mitchell and Thiero are willing to accept fewer minutes and shots, but the team is better with them on the floor taking those shots.
Our best lineup looks to be Bradshaw, Mitchell, Thiero, Reeves, and Sheppard. Wagner, Edwards, Dillingham, and Onyenso aren’t looking to be role players. Can Calipari command allegiance to the team or has he already promised too much? The answer to that question will be the difference between a Final 4 appearance and a first weekend loss. This team has so much promise, but too much may have already been promised.
The reaction is overblown due the fact we haven’t even play a 3rd of our schedule yet and everybody thinks it February. It’d early to judge this team and yes they got work to do especially defense side of the ball. The good thing there’s plenty time to correct what needs to be done.
The tournament committee looks at signature wins AND bad losses when assigning seeds. Losing to a 17 point underdog on your home floor is about as bad as it gets. The better teams will have multiple signature wins. What separates these teams will be the UGLY losses. This one UGLY loss will lower our seeding by at least one rung, possibly 2 or 3 spots if we have another bad loss. Sure, if you are just happy to get into the Dance, this loss won’t matter, but if you have Final 4 aspirations, an UGLY loss negates two quality wins and saddles you with a lower seed. Bracketology 101.
Barry the sky isn’t falling, I’m not worry about what the NCAA committee thinks, There’s plenty time to correct our issues before March. It’s December not February that some claims to be.
Reminds me of the Dr Pepper Fansville commercial.
Cal is really good at losing games he has no business losing. He’s the only common denominator between the bad losses we suffer.
Different players and different assistants but same old Cal.
KY basketball needs a fresh start in the worst possible way.
If you don,t play defence,this happens.
Pitino would have run high screen so Shep would have lite up Rupp Arena. He’s not going to "Gun" it up, unless the coach says so. I can guarantee you he can hit 5 threes in a row. They do it all day long in practice.
Kudos to LV for never writing about "Mock" rankings in the NBA. Kinda kills it for me. Can we get a "Czar" for college ball to tamp down these proceedings?
Do like Joe B Hall, if Edwards couldn’t guard,sit him down and try other players.You have a bench so use them in case you need them later on.But since all he cares about is getting 5 star players to NBA instead of winning games,he won’t even teach a zone to guard against 3 pointer’s.Terrible in game coach
The St Peters reference above is telling. During the first 5-10 minutes the UNCW coach gave off Shaheen Holloway vibes…and I was pretty sure straight away we were gonna lose…or barely, barely win.
The real skinny here is, UK should never lose to a team like UNCW on their home floor, especially one just refurbished so beautifully, but this Kentucky team did. Disgraceful! Many of Calipari’s teams IMO seem to have no idea the tradition they are expected to embrace, with a strong will to take care business, especially against upset minded underdogs. No excuses will cut it. Shades of Gardner Webb perhaps? UNCW is good team, one led by a coach on a Gardner Webb team who killed the giant once before, at Rupp no less. Was that fact on the scouting report?
The only way Kentucky will hang number 9 in Rupp is if fans send in the number 9 as a cutout to hang.
Number 9 definitely won’t come while the current joker of a coach is here.
That joker has had the number #1 recruiting class and some older vets playing pretty well early in the season and you know as the season goes along Kentucky teams only get better under Cal. Kinda sounds like you would rather them lose because of a dislike regardless of if they win or not. That’s definitely a true wildcat fan.