UK Athletics Photo
It was not a perfect team win but it might have been about as close as Kentucky could get and certainly perhaps its best overall team play of the season.
Kentucky smacked Vanderbilt 66-53 in Nashville Tuesday night. Remember, Vanderbilt got 63 points in the second half in a recent win over Arkansas but could not solve Kentucky’s defense.
On offense, the Cats did not have a star but instead had unbelievable balance.
— Antonio Reeves was 7-for-14 from the field and had 16 points.
— Oscar Tshiebwe was just Oscar. He had 15 points on 7-for-10 shooting along with 13 rebounds, including 11 on the defensive end. It was his 40th double-double at UK . He also had two assists and continued to pass the ball well to open teammates when Vandy collapsed its defense on him.
“Coach has really been working on me. Catch and look,” Tshiebwe said on the UK Radio Network. “I have to kick it out. When the defender moves, I tell players to make sure they move to another spot so I can see you.”
— Jacob Toppin played flawlessly. He was 6-for-7 from the field and took only shots he could and did make. He had 10 rebounds, including nine on defense, along with two blocks and two assists. He had just one turnover in 34 minutes.
“We trust in each other. We have come a long way,” Toppin told the SEC Network’s Alyssa Lang after the game. “We have been through a lot of ups and downs. Now we trust the next man to make a play.”
— CJ Fredrick had 10 points and made two of five 3-pointers. He also had five assists and continued to be solid on defense. His court awareness and extended minutes in recent games has been huge for UK.
— Cason Wallace also went 4-for-8 from the field like Fredrick did and had 10 points. He had five rebounds, one assist and one steal and did not make a turnover running the offense.
Those five players, the Basketball Benny Lineup, accounted for 63 of UK’s 69 points and went a combined 28-for-47 from the field. They also had 33 of UK’s 37 rebounds.
It has been quite the turnaround since that embarrassing loss to lowly South Carolina in Rupp Arena. Since then, UK has won at Tennessee, beat Georgia and Texas A&M at home, and now won at Vanderbilt.
“Two weeks ago you would have been hard pressed to find two guys on the Kentucky roster playing with confidence and now you would be hard pressed to find anyone not playing with confidence,” SEC Network analyst Dane Bradshaw said. “There is not a guy on this court who does not feel good about that the way he is playing.”
9 Responses
Well, …… Cal did say “this team will need a little time “ ( which I thought was a bit strange since they played 3 warm up games in the Bahamas ! )
You gotta remember Cal wasn’t on the sidelines during the Bahamas trip. Cal constant yelling at the players during games makes the players play nervous. Oscar told Cal he needs to stop that couple weeks ago and i think this part of made the team turn around.
I hope the Magic give Oscar a good look – he brings more to a team than his BB skills. No reason in world he couldn’t make a 13 man NBA team. If he can extend his range back to 3 line eventually may even become the Christian Charles Barkley !!
THE difference in the turn-around of this team has been the absence of Wheeler. His selfish "I’m still trying to get into the NBA" style of play destroyed this team, literally. His play at Vandy was look to pass vs. look to score and he helped the team, but not any more than Wallace, Frederick, and Reeves. He is still a liability on pick and roll defense and against drives to the basket.
We need to quit this blaming wheeler for everything what this team being through and move on, the cats has won 4 in a row and lets enjoy the ride and be more positive now not what happen in the past games got 11 games left to keep improving toward for March. Go Cats!!
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Hats off to the entire team for a very strong complete game last night.
The Tennessee win remains this team’s high water mark, and the Kansas game now looms as huge relative to the durability of this turnaround.
As for Wheeler, I thought his play last night was better than it had been. However, I still believe his roll on this team should be diminished not increased.
With you Professor
Exactly.