Denzel Aberdeen (Vicky Graff Photo)
Kentucky coach Mark Pope calls it “winning time” in March but winning this afternoon against No. 5 Florida is not going to be an easy task for the Cats coming off Tuesday’s miserable performance at Texas A&M where the Cats gave up a 27-3 run to end the first half.
“March is winning time,” Pope said Thursday. “I don’t think anybody’s gonna hold back anything right now.”
Really? Who has been holding back?
Pope has made a huge deal about fatigue and Kentucky’s lack of depth limiting the Wildcats in recent weeks. Otega Oweh and Denzel Aberdeen have both averaged 35 minutes per game the last five games but the top players on a lot of teams play that many minutes. Same for Collin Chandler who is averaging about 32 minutes per game the last five games.
“Can you steal the last possession before a media timeout and get them out? Can you sit them one extra possession just to make the timeout a little bit longer? Can you find a matchup that you like, even if it’s just for 45 seconds to go?” Pope said Thursday.
“And also, we’re going to do our best to take that off the table as much as we can. We’ll get a little deeper in rotational minutes and do the best we can there and just piece it together.”
Pope promised to make no excuses when he got the Kentucky job. But he has been m making excuses about his team being tired because three players are out with injuries.
“These Saturday/Tuesdays have been a little bit challenging for us with our limited, limited roster size right now,” Pope said after Tuesday’s loss at Texas A&M when UK turned a 12-point lead with 8 minutes to go in the first half into a 12-point halftime deficit — and Pope only called one timeout during the 27-3 run.
Plus every SEC team has to play games on Saturday and again on Tuesday or on Wednesday and then on Saturday. Kentucky is not the only SEC with “only” three days between games.
That’s something you may hear in November to open the season or in January once the long breaks between games transition into a structured two-per-week schedule — not game 30 out of 31.
“It’s not concerning in terms of my evaluation of our guys,” Pope said about the Texas A&M loss. “We have terrific players that care so deeply about this. We fell victim to what Texas A&M likes to do. The way these guys delivered on what we were trying to do in the first 10, 12, 14 minutes of the game was spectacular, and then — whether it’s fatigue or emotional fatigue, or physical fatigue, or distraction, whatever, we just went away from that.”
Pope felt Kentucky gave Texas A&M energy but still promised this team has “great things ahead of us” even though I am not sure many UK fans are buying that after some of this season’s lopsided losses.
“We don’t have a massive margin for error. It’s got to be every single possession. If we can learn that and grab on to that, then we have a chance to be really special. It’s got to be every single night we lace it up. It’s got to be. That’s not a challenge unique to us,” Pope said after the Texas A&M loss.
“That’s one of the challenges that sports presents, but it’s something that we have got to figure it out, and we can. I have the guys to do it. We can do it.”
Pope said his team has “actually been good at getting over losses.” Kentucky fans might feel the team has had way too many losses to get over and not look at that as a positive like Pope is.
“We’ve actually been good at getting over losses. We haven’t been great at getting over wins. We’ve got to get over a win and get back to work. Now we get to do it. Pretty soon here, we get to do it in 24 hours,” Pope said. “We have a massive game Saturday, and then from then on, it’s 24- and 48-hour turnarounds. And we can do it.”
7 Responses
I'm predicting Florida in a blow out this time around..Got a bad feeling this time around.
Pope has to decide what is more important: Being the coach and demand the team play as a team…even if he has to bench the hero guys OR let the hero guys continue to impress the NBA scouts and watch the team go down in defeat. The hero guys can and do play team ball on occasion and I am referring to Oweh and Aberdeen. The other two…Dioubate and Garrison ALWAYS play hero ball. Pope needs to dismiss them from the team to show he is serious about this and give Oweh and Aberdeen a reason to play team ball from now on. The outcome may still be a loss, but losing playing the right way is ok…you just got beat by a better team. Losing playing hero ball is not acceptable…you lost by being selfish and the whole team suffered because a few heroes didn't care about the name on the front of the jersey.
Coach Pope, you are trying to show that you deserve the chance to come back and coach a third year. Show us that you have command of this team. Show us that you can get them to play as a team again. A third year is not guaranteed. Make the most of it.
I was a big critic of Mo-D for a long time but I think over the last 4-5 games he has kinda kept us in the game from a offensive rebounding and playing good defense down low. I dont understand why he always starts the games out playing Jelly then the last 10-12 mins of the game all he plays is Garrison. I don't know what he sees in BG. He rarely ever does anything good. I wouldn't want BG back. Mo has actually played much better the second half of the season. Potter is really better than both of them and he could be getting backup minutes behind Moreno but for some reason we are good enough to redshirt players. That's what makes no sense. Hawthorne might not even be on the team next year so why redshirt these players? Potter has two more years of eligibility who knows we're he will play the next two years. We were deep enough to redshirt some guys but Pope really did all this to himself. Our average height is 6'8" that's bigger than NBA teams. We have no point guard and a average height of that tall no wonder we look slow and unable to move we are way to big. With no point guard. Most teams in this situation would get beat by at least 20 points by everyone. We are somehow supposed to still win. If Noah doesn't transfer I will be very surprised. I actually think Noah will finally be ready next year to make a difference on this team. He actually rebounds the ball very well his problem is hitting shots when they count. I don't know how many times Noah has been put in the game and missed a 3 when we really needed one. I think he gets nervous that if he misses he will be taken out so he put unneeded pressure on himself.
This year has been a wild one. With 3 starters out and no point guards on the team I don't really expect much out of this team. If we can get a win against a great Florida team we will be lucky. That's what it will take to beat Florida today is luck. If we aren't hitting our 3s we definitely don't have a chance. If we have stupid turnovers we won't have a chance as well. Our bigs would also have to play a great game. I think Florida has the best front court in college basketball. The good news is they won't be that good next year. They are losing most of there team this year but they do have Todd Golden one of the best coaches in college basketball. I wish we would have gotten Golden instead of Pope. I even think Dusty May would have been a better hire. I see he has Michigan dominating this year. Barnhart picked the one coach who never made a march madness run. That was my biggest WTF moment when they hired Pope. It was like why? What made him even a candidate to be the coach of a blue blood like Kentucky?? I think we lose to Florida by 5-7 points. It will be a close game until the end where free throws will be the difference.
I never thought a Ferrari fatigued
Right now UK clearly has no idea how to spend its money on players.. ( And paying Barnhart ).. But confining it to just N.I.L. . Concerning Basketball. Why are we lagging behind on getting a g.m.? Will it make Pope a better Coach ? Maybe.. But the money part he'd be relieved of and given over to G.M. Look we're already writing checks to players might as well go whole hog. Get someone who is better at evaluating talent and how to spend the money.. Pope came in here with all the right words and bluster and looks lost . The coach he played for at UK made this job look easy . Thus far he looks like he's in very deep water.
1. You can't decide to play basketball 15 points down with 6 minutes to go. If you are getting out- muscled you play fast.
2. you can't wait for the officials to save you. They're not reliable.
KY has to recruit some hungry players. They perform better.
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