John Clay’s Sidelines

Photo by Matt Barton.

When a team shoots 31 percent from the floor, and that’s considered an improvement, well, that’s all you need to know about said team. Poor Matthew Mitchell. His Kentucky women’s basketball Wildcats just can’t shoot straight.

The UK women fell 66-57 at Western Kentucky last night in Bowling Green. That’s UK’s fourth loss in its last five meetings to the rival Lady Toppers. It’s also the Cats’ third loss in seven games this young season.

And after shooting 27.9 percent against Long Island in the finals of a New York tournament over the weekend, and 21 percent in a loss at Xavier on Tuesday, the UK women improved, a relative term, to 31 percent on Thursday.

To be fair, the Cats were without starting guard Carly Ormerod last night, but I think we’ve spotted an ice age:

• Victoria Dunlap has made six of 21 shots in her last three games.

• Brittany Edelen has made four of 14 shots in her last three games. She was 3-of-9 against the Toppers.

• Lydia Watkins has made four of 12 shots in her last three games.

• Amber Smith has made four of 23 shots in her last three games. She was 1-of-10 at Xavier; 1-of-7 at Western. She missed four of her five three-pointers last night. As a team, UK missed 13 of 16, shooting a frigid 18.8 percent behind the line.

• Amani Franklin has made 10 of 37 shots in her last three games. Franklin was 3-of-15 in Bowling Green.

Luckily Eleia Roddy, after missing all 10 of her field goal attempts at Xavier, connect on seven of 13 tries last night or things would have surely been worse.

And surely rubbing salt in the wounds, former UK signee Arnkia Brown contributed 12 points and 16 rebounds to the Western win. This despite the fact that Brown was indicted last month on counterfeiting charges. She plead not guilty.