John Clay's Sidelines

SEC links for Monday:

• David Climer of the Tennessean writes that Tennessee hurt despite its best season.

• Mike Griffith of the Knoxville News-Sentinel on the Vols’ foul ending in loss to Michigan State.

• It was agonizing, but Tennessee took a step in the right direction, writes Mike Strange of the News-Sentinel.

• Wayne Chism won’t soon be forgotten, writes Mark Wiedmer of the Chattanooga Times Free Press.

• Jim Lamar of the Tallahassee Democrat reports on Florida State knocking Mississippi State from women’s tourney.

• Ole Miss hits the high points in New York, reports Parrish Alford of the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal.

Continue reading ‘SEC links: Tennessee takes step forward, falls short’

(H-L photo)

Big Blue Links for Sunday:

Jerry Tipton of the Herald-Leader writes that WVU stunned cold-shooting Cats:

Kentucky missed its first 20 three-point attempts en route to a 4-for-32 display of futility from beyond the arc. That marked UK’s third-worst accuracy of the season.

The Cats also shot their third-worst percentage of the season from the foul line: 55.2. They made only 11 of their first 23 free throws on the way to a 16-for-29 night.

My column says that in the season’s biggest game, Kentucky played its worst game:

In the end, Kentucky picked the biggest game of the year to play its worst game of the year.

In the end, Kentucky’s wondrous freshmen, who had been so mature, so poised, played so young.

In the end, a great and wondrous season that had taken the Wildcats so far, came up short.

Mark Story of the H-L writes on UK’s backcourt no match for West Virginia:

“They were a long, athletic team,” Wall said of West Virginia. “They did a great job of denying us from getting to the wings. We didn’t make enough shots to spread them out. Hats off to them, their defense did a great job.”

Bledsoe had an even rougher night. His first half was lost to foul trouble, as he picked up his second with 13:17 left and sat out the remainder of the half.

(AP photo)

Herald-Leader photo gallery from the UK-West Virginia game.

Mike Freeman of CBS Sports writes that UK didn’t get its money’s worth out of Calipari:

When you sell your soul, as Kentucky did to get John Calipari, there are supposed to be riches and fame and rainbows, not an embarrassing butt whipping with the Final Four on the line.

It’s not just that Kentucky lost to West Virginia 73-66. It’s how the Wildcats lost: whining, complaining, gyrating, crying, flailing and temper tantrum-ing over almost every call the game officials made. One outburst led to a technical foul. They seemed more obsessed over officiating than they were about playing ball.

Brett Dawson of the Courier-Journal on WVU’s upset of the Cats:

Early in the second half, DeMarcus Cousins struck Da’Sean Butler below the belt after he missed a contested shot from close range. (Cousins protested, saying he hadn’t hit Butler on purpose.)

“I don’t think it dealt with youth,” forward Patrick Patterson said. “I think veterans would have done the same, just because calls weren’t going (our) way or the ball wasn’t falling through the net. … We were extremely frustrated with our performance in the first half and extremely frustrated with the way things were going in the first half.”

Continue reading ‘BBL: The sad, sad links after a happy UK season’

SEC links for Sunday:

• Is Tennessee tough enough to make it to the men’s Final Four? Mike Griffith of the Knoxville News-Sentinel asks the question.
• Tennessee women suffer a surprising defeat, reports Dan Fleser of the News-Sentinel.
• David Climer of the Tennessean on Tennessee center Brian Williams’ second chance.
• Steven Pearl has proven invaluable, writes Mark Wiedmer of the Chattanooga Times Free Press.
• Orlando Sentinel report on Florida’s Urban Meyer apologizing to Sentinel reporter Jeremy Fowler.
• Mike Bianchi of the Sentinel wants to know where’s the apology from the Florida reporters?
• Mike Herndon of the Mobile Press-Register says Auburn has entered Tony Barbee’s world.
• Leave the NCAA Tournament alone, says Rick Cleveland of the Clarion-Ledger.
• Tim Tucker of the AJC on Georgia’s first spring football scrimmage.
• Alabama’s Mark Ingram must deal with more attention, writes A. Stacy Long of the Montgomery Advertiser.

Courtesy of asapsports.com.

NCAA MEN’S REGIONAL SEMIFINALS & FINALS: SYRACUSE

March 27, 2010

John Calipari
DeMarcus Cousins
Patrick Patterson
John Wall

SYRACUSE, NEW YORK

West Virginia – 73
Kentucky – 66

THE MODERATOR: Coach, players, thank you guys for coming in here. Coach, can we ask you to make a quick opening statement.
COACH JOHN CALIPARI: Hats off to West Virginia. I mean, they did what they had to. They made shots. The 1-3-1 bothered us. We tried different things and it bothered us more than I thought it would. They made plays. They ran their offense and got some lay-ups at critical times, just lay-ups. And we’re a team that doesn’t give up many lay-ups. We gave a bunch up today.
I’m proud of my team. They fought, they just kept trying. I’m proud of what they’ve done all season. A bunch of young kids that just came together. We’ve had shooting days like this, but we won anyway because maybe the teams weren’t quite as good as West Virginia. But today that team was too good for us to shoot like we did from the free-throw line and still win the game.
THE MODERATOR: Thank you, Coach. We’ll take questions for the student-athletes first. Again, if you could please direct your questions to a specific student-athlete.

Q. John, talk about going against that 1-3-1 and why was it so tough?
JOHN WALL: It was pretty tough. They’re a long athletic team. They did a great job denying us from getting to the wings. And like Coach said, we wasn’t making enough shots. I think if we would have made shots, it would have spread out. You give hats off for them. Their defense did a great job on us and we didn’t knock down shots today.

Q. John, could you ever imagine this run ending without making it to the Final Four? And all the talk is going to start about what you’re going to be doing next year.
JOHN WALL: I didn’t want it to stop. I wanted us to make it all the way. Like Coach said, it was one of those days where we wasn’t making shots. Usually we win these type of games. They are a great team. We couldn’t fight our way through it and win.
I’m not worried about talk about the talk what I’m doing next. I’m sad and disappointed we didn’t make it far as the goals we reached as a team. I’m going to sit back and enjoy the rest of my college year with my teammates and finish the rest of the school year out.

Q. DeMarcus, it looked like you were a little frustrated with the officiating tonight. What did you think of the way the game was being called?
DeMARCUS COUSINS: West Virginia played a great game tonight. They outplayed us tonight. I mean, there was some loose balls we should have got. We were bad on defense tonight. They outplayed us, and we lost.

Continue reading ‘Transcript of UK’s post-game press conference’

(H-L photo/Mark Cornelison)

Some immediate thoughts after Kentucky’s 73-66 loss to West Virginia:

It was a great season. Kentucky ended up 35-3. It returned to the big table as far as college basketball is concerned. We got to watch John Wall for a season, and DeMarcus Cousins. We got to watch Patrick Patterson having fun. We got to see a team playing with smiles on their faces, and having fun. We got to see a fan base re-energized just by its beloved program being relevant again. That all goes back to John Calipari and what he brought to the program.

Thought Kentucky’s youth somewhat caught up to it at the end. The missed threes turned viral. Not going to win many games in which you miss your first 20 three-point shots. Also thought the Cats were befuddled by Bob Huggins’ 1-3-1 zone. West Virginia looked like the older, more confident team. Hitting three-pointers just bouyed WVU’s confidence. Hitting and missing successive threes can have that kind of affect on teams.

Wasn’t one of Patrick Patterson’s best games, which was too bad considering it came against his home-state school. Patterson had 13 rebounds, so it wasn’t froma lack of effort. But he missed all four of his three-point shots and he turned it over three times.

DeMarcus Cousins had five turnovers, and seemed to let the officials get to him. West Virginia did a good job against Cousins with its length. But when Cuz didn’t get the calls, he looked upset, frustrated. He scored 15 points and had eight rebounds, but he wasn’t the required factor for his team.

Eric Bledsoe had an abysmal night, missing all five of his three-point shots, missing five of six free throws. He fouled out with seven points.

DeAndre Liggins played decent defense, but made some questionable plays on offense and ended up fouling out.

I thought rebounding would be a huge factor, but it turned out to be little factor. Kentucky won the boards 51-36. It grabbed 24 offensive rebounds to West Virginia’s 26 defensive rebounds. But that hardly mattered. Kentucky took 15 more shots than the Mountaineers (67-52) yet made just three more field goals.

Kentucky scored just eight points off turnovers. West Virginia scored 19.

Continue reading ‘Immediate thoughts right after the Kentucky loss’

The view from my hotel window.

Some daily randoms from Syracuse as we await the UK-West Virginia 7 p.m. tipoff:

Having apparently seen my Huggins-Calipari column today, John Vergos, one of the owners of the Rendezvous restaurant in Memphis sent me this e-mail:

Hey John,

As one of the owners of the Rendezvous, I was there in 2002 when Cincinnati beat Memphis on a last second shot. It pretty much doomed Memphis’s chance for an NCAA bid.

That was, to this day, one of the most entertaining and unusual nights I’ve ever encountered in the 62 year history of the Rendezvous.

It was a late game, and we stayed open way past closing for Coach Huggins and his staff. He was of course in his typical sullen, funny mood when Coach Cal shows up with his priest.

For the next 2 hours these 2 characters proceeded to trade every barb, curse word, insult, and sports story one could imagine. The only person not blushing was Coach Cal’s priest.

We laughed so hard at these two trying to top each other’s story, half of which was pure B.S.

When it was all over they both exchanged hugs, and I sat there and thought – wow- what did I just witness.

As a stalwart Memphis fan, I’ve booed coach Huggins with the best of them, and of course Coach Cal won’t be winning any Mr. Memphis awards, but these are two great personalities

I’ll never forget that night. I wish I’d have caught it on tape.

John Vergos

Missed this for the BBL, but Bill Rhoden of the New York Times has a good column on UK assistant Rod Strickland, calling him one of the best stories of the NCAA Tournament.

Who says the SEC plays bad basketball? The SEC and the Big 12 are the only conferences with two teams in the Elite Eight, thanks to Tennessee’s win over Ohio State last night, coupled with Kentucky’s victory over Cornell on Thursday. Kansas State and Baylor are the two Big 12 teams remaining. The ACC, Big East, Horizon and Big Ten each have one left. Understand the Tennessee fans were chanting, “SEC! SEC! SEC!” in St. Louis on Friday after the Vols victory, which caused Bruce Pearl to say, “I’m proud to tears.”

Speaking of Pearl, I know he and John Calipari don’t see eye-to-eye, and that Cal won’t give the Tennessee coach much credit for anything, but you have to give Bruce props for the job he did this year. He had to kick Tyler Smith off the team. And Smith was supposed to be his best player. Yes, there may have been some addition by subtraction there, but Pearl has molded a very good basketball team out of a lot of turmoil. Plus, I love what Pearl says about his bench. All coaches have a bench. That’s why you have 13 scholarships. But not all coaches develop their bench. To develop your bench, you have to play your bench. Tennessee’s depth helped the Vols hold Ohio State to 32 percent shooting in the second half. The no-depth Buckeyes ran out of gas.

Continue reading ‘Rendezvous remembrance, and more notes from ‘Cuse’

If you look at the stats comparisons between Kentucky and West Virginia, you notice that Kentucky has a better rebound margin, but West Virginia may be the better rebounding team. Bob Huggins’ teams are usually tenacious on the boards. This West Virginia team is no different. The Mountaineers are grabbing 42.5 percent of the available offensive rebounds, to 40.7 for Kentucky. Plus, WVU has done a better job of keeping the other team off the offensive glass. Opponents are rebounding just 31.3 percent of the available offensive rebounds, compared to 32.1 percent by Kentucky’s opponents.

So here’s how both teams have done on the glass during the first three games of the NCAA Tournament: