John Clay’s Sidelines

You can credit Edgar Sosa’s 26-foot bomb that gave Louisville its 7-471 win over Kentucky on Sunday. You can harp on the ‘Ville’s surprisingly accurate 55 percent shooting from three-point land – previous season-best was 47.8 versus Ohio University. You can blame the Billy Gillispie technical foul that squelched his own team’s momentum. You can cite a dozen reasons for the Cats loss at Freedom Hall.

But it really boils down to one.

The same one.

Turnovers.

Same old story, same old song and dance. Broken record, yes, but it’s also true that until Kentucky cuts down on its viral tendency to turn the ball over,  this ’08-09 edition will never reach its full potential, and Sunday presented a definite example as to why, or why not.

Kentucky shot 46.9 percent. Louisville shot 46.8 percent. Kentucky made 23 field goals. Louisville made 22 field goals. Kentucky made 19 of 22 free throws. Louisville made 19 of 23 free throws. Those numbers seem to suggest that the difference in the game was the fact the Cards made 11 of 20 three-pointers, while Kentucky was just six of 16 from beyond the stripe. And there is no doubting the significance of that.

But here’s the thing. Coming in, a reasonable Kentucky concern was rebounding. Talking to Mike Pratt before the game, the UK radio analyst expressed a fear that the Cats might be bludgeoned on the boards. A legitimate fear. Louisville had outrebounded its last eight opponents. The better teams had battered the Cats on the boards. UK lost the boards by 14 to North Carolina, by 19 to Kansas State, by 13 to West Virginia, even by 7 to Indiana.

But the Cats didn’t lose the boards Sunday. They actually whipped Louisville 32-22 on the glass. Even better, the Cats pulled down twice as many offensive rebounds (14-7) as did the host Cardinals. Louisville had 15 defensive rebounds, which means there were 29 available rebounds on the U of L end of the floor UK’s offensive end. Amazingly, Kentucky got nearly 50 percent of those boards.

Continue reading ‘UK’s turnover virus’

Photo by Mark Cornelison.

News and notes after Kentucky’s 74-71 loss to Louisville:

• Kentucky turned it over 21 times, including 14 in the first half. That’s the sixth time this year UK has turned it over at least 20 times in a game. Last year’s Cats did it only five times all season.

• Kentucky averaged 1.07 points per possession. Louisville averaged 1.12 points per possession.

• The 1.12 is the highest against UK since VMI averaged 1.21 in UK’s season-opening loss.

• U of L made 11 of 20 three-pointers for 55 percent. That’s the best three-point shooting against the Cats since San Diego made nine of 16 for 56.3 percent in its win over the Cats on Dec. 29 last season.

• The 11 threes are not the most UK has allowed in a game this year. VMI made 14 of 31.

• Jodie Meeks scored 28 points, but he did have six turnovers and no assists. It is his most turnovers since he committed nine against Kansas State in Las Vegas.

• Kevin Galloway started at point guard, but played just four minutes.

Continue reading ‘UK-U of L post-game’

For those who don’t want to follow along on the Liveblog chat, I’ll be posting old-school updates of Kentucky-Louisville throughout the game at Freedom Hall:

• Sosa hits deep three with 2.8 to give Louisville win 74-71.

• U of L up 71-67 with 32.4 left.

• Louisville up 69-64 with ball with 58.5 seconds remaining. Two bad turnover son last two Cat possessions.

• Cats call time at 1:59, with ball, down 66-64. Porter 3 cut it to 1.
  

• Ville up 66-61 at 3:49 mark. Williams just called for palming. Louisville has 12 turnovers to 19 for Cats. Ville now down to 45.7. It missed four shots in one possession. UK up 29-20 on boards. Cats shooting 50 percent.

• There’s Meeks for a 3. It’s 64-59 Ville as Cards call time at 6:43. Samuels back in.

• Louisville leads 64-53 with 7:48 remaining. Cards have hit 10 of 17 threes. Who says Pitino has lost it? Smith is 3-of-3. Williams is 3-of-4. Louisville shot 29.6 percent from floor on Wednesday. Cards are shooing 51.3 now.

• It’s 57-48 Louisville with 11:57 left. Wild half as neither bench is happy with officials. U of L had a 12-0 run after the Gillispie T. UK  is shooting 48.6 percent for game. Meeks (18) and Patterson (17) have 35 of UK’s 48 points.

• Louisville back in front 49-43 at 15:35. Cards have scored 7 straight since Gillispie technical at 17:14. Will Scott off the bench for four of those points, including a big 3. UK had gone ahead 43-42 before Billy G. was hit with T.

• Patterson had nine rebounds the first half.

• Louisville shot 44.4 percent on 12 of 27 shots the first half. Cards made five of 10 threes, and 9 of 10 from foul line. Cards were outrebounded 19-9. U of L turned it over six times, and had eight steals to two for Cats. Clark and Sosa each have nine points.

• Kentucky shot an even 50 percent the first half, making 12 of 24. UK was 3-of-7 on 3s, and 8-of-9 from foul line. Meeks leads way with 14. Patterson is next with 8. UK committed 14 turnovers in the first half.

• Halftime: Louisville 38, Kentucky 35.

• Louisville 36-29 with 3:16 left. Cards are 12-of-24 from floor. UK is 11-of-21. Meek has 14, but no other Cat has more than five. UK up to 12 turnovers.
  

• It’s 28-24 Louisville at 7:13 TV time. UK is shooting 62.5 percent and down four. Meek is 5-of-8 from floor, 2-of-3 from 3. Remember, he scored 46 on this floor against Appy State. Louisville has six points from Jerry Smith, who just hit two threes. Meeks has 14 points to lead all scorers.

Continue reading ‘Updates: UK-U of L’

College basketball on the tube for Sunday, Jan. 4:

Jerry Tipton just updated his blog, quoting Darius Miller’s father as saying the freshman is not leaving UK.

Here’s the post.

Excerpt:

During UK’s victory over Central Michigan on Monday, television cameras showed Darius Miller looking unhappy on the bench. There’s been subsequent talk about Miller returning home to Maysville, which fueled speculation him leaving the team.

“No, that’s not true,” his father said in a phone conversation late Tuesday evening.

When asked if his son was OK, Brian Miller said, “He’s doing fine. . . . He’s just a little frustrated. That’s all.”

Photo by Helena Hau.

Update: There were internet rumors last night that Miller had left the team, but UK insists that’s not true. By some reports, Miller did appear visibly upset on the bench near the end of Monday night’s game. There was also talk that he returned home to Maysville on Tuesday, but remember it is Christmas break, and school is not in session at UK. Below is my post from yesterday:

Another update.

In his last two games, UK’s Darius Miller has played just 17 minutes and scored all of two points. Not exactly Mr. Basketball type numbers, or blue-chip recruit type numbers. But the former Mason County star is a freshman, who appears to be encountering the usual rookie struggled.

Asked Billy Gillispie about Miller after UK’s win over Central Michigan last night:

His attitude is great. He’s probably too good a kid, and I don’t mean kid in any kind of derogatory – I guess some people take offense to that. There’s not a better person that I’ve ever been around. He’s probably too respectful to his teammates, and that’s a pretty nice compliment for saying something that he could improve on. He’s got to be more competitive, and he’s got to go and take something from somebody. But I think he’s just going through a tough time right now. He’s probably not reacting naturally, and he is a very, very intelligent basketball player, he’s a very gifted player. He’s one of the most important players on our team, in my opinion, as we move forward. We just have to be a little bit more aggressive on defense. But I’m not concerned about long-term or anything like that. I’d be surprised if he didn’t play greater next time out. He just defers to people a little bit too much. I think that’s because of his niceness. He’s the best person you’ve ever been around – yes, sir; no, sir; no matter what, great teammate. But we need to get him going.

Here is Miller’s last four games:

Photo by Mark Cornelison.

Three points on UK’s 84-52 win over Central Michigan last night:

• 1. At least from a statistical standpoint, UK’s defense was much-improved over last Saturday’s nipping of Florida Atlantic. The Cats allowed an average of 1.05 points per possession against the Owls. That was down to 0.78 last night. True, Central Michigan is not as talented as Florida Atlantic, it did not appear. The Owls made eight of 17 three-pointers on Saturday, where the Chips made just five of 18 last night. But after CMU started the game making seven of 16 shots, the Chips cooled considerably, making just 11 of 42 the remainder of the game.

• 2. UK’s turnover count continues to improve. The Cats were not quite as careful with the basketball as they were on Saturday. Billy Gillispie’s club committed a turnover just once every 9.09 possessions versus the Owls. The figure was once every 5.4 last night. But there were 70 possessions in the CMU game, compared to 63 against FAU as Mike Jarvis’ team milked the clock. Kentucky’s points per possession figured out to 1.20 last night, compared to 1.195 on Saturday. After shooting 53.6 percent last night, the Cats have shot better than 50 percent in each of their last three games.

• 3. Perry Stevenson played 23 miutes last night without scoring. The junior forward took just one shot, a miss. He did grab four rebounds, make three assists and blocked two shots. But it was the first time since Jan. 12, 2008, in the double-overtime win over Vandy, that the Louisiana native has failed to score. The last UK player to play more minutes without scoring was Derrick Jasper, who played all 40 minutes in UK’s NCAA loss to Marquette without scoring a point.

Click here for the slideshow from UK’s 84-52 win over the Chips.

Photo by Mark Cornelison.

Central Michigan coach Ernie Ziegler was not brought to the post-game press conference, but we’ve just given his comments.

A couple of exercepts:

Is Kentucky the best team you’ve played this year?

I couldn’t argue with that. I think that their athleticism and length is what we really struggled with. They do a good job of pressuring you and putting you where you have to finish over their length. They are not ranked, but they are definitely one of the better teams that we have faced. Marquette may be a notch above them, but Kentucky will be an NCAA Tournament team.

Did you know you were going to have to play a near perfect game to win tonight?

You know that the margin of error is so slim for us and for any team coming into Kentucky and playing in this atmosphere. For us, in light of the other adversity we have in our roster and lack of depth up front, we have to be able to continue to sustain the focus that we started the game with. Once that focus started to wane and we started to get fatigued they were able to impose their will.