Kentucky should have learned against Texas A&M how much it needs Antonio Reeves on the court. (Vicky Graff Photo)
Texas A&M finally found a way to stop Antonio Reeves — get him in foul trouble and have Kentucky coach John Calipari put him on the bench.
Reeves played only 18 minutes in Friday’s 97-87 Southeastern Conference Tournament loss to Texas A&M before fouling out. He was 4-for-7 from the field and 3-for-5 at the foul line to score 13 points ending his streak of seven straight games of at least 20 points. He was the first player to do that since Jamal Murray had 12 20-point games in a row since 2016.
Reeves has been a scoring machine. He’s been in double figures every game but one this season and made at least one 3-pointer in every game. He has 1,128 points in his two seasons as a Wildcat – moving past Oscar Tshiebwe (1,117) and Randolph Morris (1,123) to No. 47 on the all-time UK list.
After the loss Calipari was asked if this game showed just how much Kentucky had to have Reeves on the court.
“I thought there were some opportunities for him to get shots before he got in foul trouble,” Calipari said. “Went through that little floater you have, he had two or three opportunities to do it.
“He never really got in rhythm. He made a couple. I thought at half, he makes that shot, now he’s going to get going.”
That led Calipari to use one of his favorite phrases after any UK loss.
“I’m going to say they’re not machines and robots, they don’t play great every night out. Can we say it’s rebounding or the foul trouble? Can we say it’s Texas A&M, the way they played? Reed (Sheppard) didn’t get as many shots off in the second half. We’re trying to get him more shots. They did a good job. Couldn’t quite get ’em off,” Calipari said.
“Yeah, we need him (Reeves). We need him. Again, we need all of ’em. We need everybody on the team.”
Kentucky finds out tonight when and where it will play in the NCAA Tournament. Calipari hopes his team learned against Texas A&M how difficult the first tournament game can be — something UK obviously did not grasp in the 2022 NCAA Tournament.
“I’ve done this a long, long time. Been in a lot of these kind of tournaments, a lot of NCAA tournaments. Hardest game is the first one when you got a team like we have. When you get by the first one, a little bit more of a downhill run,” the UK coach said.
“There’s teams around the country right now losing this game because they’re learning it, that that first one’s a hard one. Now, I think they’ll know when we talk about it next week, that wherever we end up, we’re going to have a tough first game. It will be hard.”
It will be but maybe Calipari also learned that he will need to trust Reeves more and let him play longer with two fouls in the first half or three fouls in the second half. Reeves had only fouled out of one previous game this season and Kentucky cannot risk not having his shooting, leadership and even defense on the court for over half a game.
7 Responses
On such a poor defensive team, it’s hard to not want to try and pick up the slack but Reeves has to understand that he has to stay on the floor. That game had some strange officiating, but that’s part of the game. It speaks loudly to playing more zone and not abandon it the first time someone makes a 3. Of course, playing zone now is more of an experiment than a plan since we haven’t played more than 20 minutes of it all season. This is just another glaring example of how Calipari’s way isn’t working. It’s time for Kentucky to make a change.
Oh, where is Jimmy? I was hoping he could tell me where the celebration is? I’d sure hate to miss it.
Reeves clearly has to be on the floor.
Not making excuses why they loss, but I thought they call cheapy fouls on Reeves.
Agree with you Cats 79. Thought a couple of those fouls called on Reeves were questionable.
Especially since they let a lot of pushing and shoving underneath the basket by A&M go without
being called.
Excuses are for losers
Stanford head coach Jerod Haase announced his firing at his press conference following a Pac-12 Tournament game loss. He handled it with class.
"I have not won here to the level that I expect," Haase said. "Just like I hold my team accountable, I’m being held accountable, and I have no issue with that."
That is taking accountability. It’s time for John Calipari to do the honorable thing as well.
Awesome article.