Vicky Graff Photo
Going into Thursday night’s Southeastern Conference opener against Mississippi State in Memorial Coliseum, Kentucky already has 11 wins in coach Kenny Brooks’ first season.
That is significant because the Kentucky women won only 12 games each of the previous two seasons under former coach Kyra Elzy.
“What happened here last year, I wasn’t here,” Brooks said after his team’s win over Western Kentucky to end non-conference play. “So it’s not a benchmark for us at all.”
That’s the best attitude possible for a coach to have because what happened in the past means nothing with the new team Brooks had to assemble. Only two players — Cassidy Rowe and Saniah Tyler — return from last year’s team. Brooks also has two players — Jordan Obi and Dominika Paurova — he was counting on as significant contributors out with season-ending injuries.
“You set your own benchmarks for what you think that particular team can do,” Brooks said after the Western win. “Everything that happened here last year, we don’t know. We have no idea.
“It’s kind of like the same thing when people tell me how beautiful Historic Memorial is compared to what it was. Well, I didn’t know what it was. So we’re just going off of what it is now, and that’s what we’re doing here.
“So 11 wins is really good out of (12) tries, and we’re going to continue to just try to win them all and just play good basketball every day.”
Kentucky has been doing that and the fan support has been growing. Kentucky went unbeaten at home in non-conference play, the first time that has happened in four years.
“You always want to protect home court. You value that. It’s a sense of pride. Because you play for more than just the team. You play for the name on the front, you play for Big Blue Nation, and when they come into the building you want to represent in front of them,” Brooks said. “For us to be able to go undefeated, putting together a new basketball team, is a sense of accomplishment for us.
“I’m very, very proud of that situation because to win a basketball game at this level is hard. It’s very hard. And so for us to be able to win all of them so far that we’ve played through non-conference, I think it gives a sense of pride to BBN.”
