Kentucky vs. Tennessee Part II: Takeaways

Kentucky closed out the regular season with it’s biggest win of the year with a 85-81 road win over the top 5 Vols.  The Cats seem to be playing their best ball at the right time as attention turns to Nashville for the SEC Tournament.

Reed and Reeves Light It Up

Reed Sheppard and Antonio Reeves gave us another memorable performance as the pair combined for 54 points (27 each) on just 30 combined shots.  Collectively they shot 10/15 from 3 and 10/11 from the FT.  They also combined for 13 rebounds and Reed chipped in 5 assists.  They put on a show against, statistically, one of the best defenses in the country.

What may be more impressive though is the timing of their points.  Several times it felt like Tennessee was going to make a run with their home crowd behind them but every time Reeves and/or Reed would get a big basket to wrestle back control.  BBN needs to enjoy this whole team but especially these two.  We are only going to get them for a few more games (hopefully 9 more to be exact).

Justin Continues His Renaissance

Around early February the calls to bench Justin Edwards and/or cut him out of the rotation were deafening. Thankfully, Justin had good people around him and didn’t let the toxicity bother him.  Since February 6^th (the first Vanderbilt game) Justin is shooting 55% from three and has scored in double figures in 6 of the 10 games.  For the season his 3P% has jumped to a healthy 38%.  It’s been more than his scoring.  His defense has improved as well as his all-around impact.

Yesterday in Knoxville Justin showed up big-time.  In 37 minutes he put in 16 points, 6 rebounds, and 3 assists.  His defense was also excellent for most of the game.  He spent time on Knecht and was able to deny him the ball several times late in the game that forced other players from Tennessee to try and beat the Cats.

Kentucky is a better team with Justin and thankfully his teammates and coach believed in him even when so-called fans pulled their support and turned toxic.  After the game there was a touching moment between Stacey Sheppard (Reed’s mother) and Justin and it sums the bond this team has.

Late-game Issues

I try to stay positive after wins but we have to talk about the last minute. In what has become a trend Kentucky struggled to close out what should have been a comfortable win.  Bizarre turnovers, bad luck with a slip, a phantom and-1 call, and a general confusion have all become late-game themes.

Part of it is opponent, Tennessee is very good at guarding in-bound situations, and they are very good at getting away with a lot of contact when trying to pressure/trap a ball-handler (they also get away with a tremendous amount of off-ball shenanigans).  We’ve seen Kentucky struggle enough to know that it’s an issue we must fix.  Earlier this week Cal publicly asked more from Reed Sheppard who seems to have a real issue in late-game situations.  It’s not just Reed though both Adou and Reeves had some brain-farts late.  It didn’t help that the phantom and-1 (seriously Zeigler was not touched) was DJ’s 5^th foul and he’s a good guy to have inbound the ball and an extra competent ball-handler.

Kentucky is making FTs in crunch time so that is a positive and it’s also a credit to them for finding ways to survive it.  It does feel like we’re playing with fire though as we turn double digit leads into nail-biters.

What Does It Mean

Make no mistake, that was a huge win.  Kentucky went on the road and beat a potential 1 seed in their building.  It clinched the 2-seed in the SEC Tournament next week and probably bumps the Cats up a seed line in the NCAA Tournament.  No team in the country can say they have 4 wins over top 10 teams in the NET (UNC, @Auburn, Alabama, and @Tennessee) except the Cats and that matters to the committee.

Regardless of seeding it’s good just to see this team have success.  Collectively, this is one of the most likable groups of players (and their families) that we’ve ever had at Kentucky.  Unfortunately they’ve had to shoulder the 5 years of angst and toxicity from BBN while also dealing with an incredibly unlucky injury crisis.  They haven’t complained but have kept their head down and done the work.

We’ll probably have a piece about regular season grades out early next week since there is s such a long lay-off and we don’t know our opponent (it’ll be A&M or Ole Miss).  For now I’ll enjoy beating these Orange Bums.

Go Cats.