Kentucky's defense dominated Ole Miss in the first half Sunday. (Vicky Graff Photo)
Mississippi coach Yolett McPhee-McCuin knew there was only one thing she could do at halftime.
Kentucky led the Rebels 39-22 at halftime — and had a 24-point lead at one point — after Ole Miss made only one of 17 shots in the second quarter, not exactly what one might expect from a team that had already won 20 games and had wins at Vanderbilt and Oklahoma.
“We started off so bad. I am not really sure why,” McPhee-McCuin said after UK won 74-57. “I remember at half the only thing I could do was smile. What the hell is going on? Who is this? This has to be a joke. This is not who we are. We come out and fight. We did not play our brand of basketball.”
However, she took the loss in stride.
“This is life in the SEC. It is dog eat dog and why you have to stay steady,” the Ole Miss coach said. “We beat Vandy and we were not celebrating. We lose today and I am not going to throw the season away.”
She had plenty more to say.
“We are known as a defensive team, and we let Kentucky score 74 points. They got on a roll and everything went in. We had uncharacteristic defensive lapses,” the Ole Miss coach said.
What about going 1 for 17 from the field in the second quarter?
“Maybe I want to credit Kentucky (which blocked seven shots in the game). They are so long and big,” the Ole Miss coach said. “In the third quarter we started going through their chests and being aggressive. I didn’t think we hit enough offensively early. They really dictated the style of play in the first 20 minutes.”
What about the 19-0 Kentucky run?
“I can’t make anything else up. We just didn’t defend. We just did not compete the way we needed to compete. I thought they did a great job game planning against us,” McPhee-McCuin said.
