Otega Oweh knows UK has to capitalize on chances to beat Texas A&M's press tonight. (Vicky Graff Photo)
Texas A&M is 19-10 and 9-7 in SEC play under first-year coach Bucky McMillan and has lost six of its past eight games, including the last two, going into tonight’s home game with Kentucky.
The Aggies dropped a 76-70 decision to Texas on Saturday while Kentucky was perhaps having its best game of the year in a win over Vanderbilt.
However, neither outcome will change the way the Aggies are going to play tonight. McMillan likes to press full court and play at a fast pace from start to finish.
“They press all game,” said Otega Oweh, UK’s leading scorer. “(They press) off a make, off a miss, they press off a free throw, they go press. It’s a physical, intense, high-intensity game. That’s what’s going to be.”
The Aggies always want to push the pace on offense and pressure the ball for 94 feet with plenty of traps intended to force turnovers.
Kentucky has 10 or more turnovers in each of its last five games. The Cats have 63 turnovers and only 71 assists in those five games. A key stat is that UK is 5-8 this year when making 11 or more turnovers and 14-2 with 10 or fewer turnovers. Kentucky had 16 assists and 10 turnovers in Saturday’s win over Vanderbilt.
“They’re gonna give us power plays,” Oweh said. “They’re a good defensive team, but when you press, you can get out of position a lot. We could just get downhill and they’re obviously gonna bring a couple people to the ball. So you get a lot of catch-and-shoot 3’s. We just have to capitalize on it.”
Kentucky (19-10, 10-6 SEC) is still in contention for a double bye in the upcoming SEC Tournament if it can win tonight and then beat visiting Florida on Saturday.
“I just want to end it on a kind of high note,” Oweh said during UK’s media opportunity on Monday.
“We can make a lot of noise,” Kentucky guard Denzel Aberdeen said. “We’ve just got to play together, be more physical, just come together and have fun.”
Kentucky lost by 25 points at Vanderbilt earlier in the season but beat Vandy 91-77 Saturday in a game that was not as close as the final score indicated. Oweh and Collin Chandler both had 23 points for UK.
“We started off the game just making plays for teammates,” Oweh said. “The ball was really popping, and on top of that, we were guarding really well, being really physical and aggressive. I think that’s what kind of set the tone for the whole game.”
5 Responses
You beat a pressing defense with passing not dribbling; but we prefer to dribble…and that leads to turnovers. The only way we can win our last 2 games is to play team ball vs. hero ball. Oweh, Aberdeen, Dioubate, and Garrison are the ones who play for the name on the back of their jersey and are a big reason for our double digit losses so far. Moreno and Jelavic are so underutilized yet they present the biggest mismatches on our team. Noah has become the forgotten man and I fear he may transfer at the season's end…yet he is the best 3 point shooter on the team. He also rebounds, plays defense, and makes free throws. Oweh got 28 and 29 points against Georgia and Auburn and we still lost; he got 8 points against South Carolina and we won. Chandler all too often has to save the day and he can't do that every time. We beat A&M and Florida by passing the ball and taking the open 3 or backdoor layup. We can win both games if we play as a team and not as a group of seniors who are more concerned about getting drafted in June. Which Kentucky team shows up?
Has anyone heard that Mitch Barnhart is going announce his retirement today.? There's some rumbling about it.
He wants to avoid the fire Pope flack if Kentucky does poorly in the tournaments.
I don't think that's the issue, he had hinted back in the fall long before basketball season started that he was nearing his retirement tenure around the first of this year. He just prolong it 6months and besides he will be still working for UK just in another position and another thing Pope isn't going anywhere that your hoping for.
He is retiring in June. That means he will have to fire Pope and find they right guy to turn this program around.