UK Athletics Photo
Kentucky was eliminated from the Southeastern Conference Tournament with Friday’s 6–5 loss to South Carolina and will now await NCAA Tournament pairings that will be made Monday.
This was the final year of the double-elimination SEC tourney as next year with Oklahoma and Texas entering the league, the SEC will go to a single elimination format with the top teams from the regular season getting byes in the first round.
Kentucky coach Nick Mingione said Friday he will “not miss” the double-elimination format.
“I will go on record and say this. The format that we’re doing is the one that I voted for, so for what that matters, I don’t know. I will say this, and I’ve said this every year: Our conference does an amazing job with this tournament,” Mingione said.
“When you just look up and down, the staff, the people, I was personally really happy that the 3 — there was no rain up to this point, and it was a 3:00 game because all the people from the grounds crew to the office to you name it, they have spent a lot of time here, and a 9:30 game was early.
Just so thankful for the job that our league and all the folks that have worked at this tournament have done. It is as good as it gets, and there is none better.”
Not everyone likes the idea of the new format but the change truly does not bother Mingione.
“The format that we’re moving to, change is not something that bothers me. I just think that we have to be able to make changes and adapt, and I think there’s a lot of times in life where we’re just like, man, change can be really hard,” Mingione said.
“But I told our players, every first year of every first team meeting I tell them, if you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change the way you think about it.
“I’m looking forward to it. Obviously there’s no changing our format that we have now, so I’m looking forward to a new challenge and a new way to compete at the highest level against some of the best teams in America.”
