Kentucky basketball showed it has what it takes on defense. Next step, make it repeatable.
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As John Calipari likes to say, this Kentucky basketball team told on itself Saturday.
Turns out, it can guard. It can rebound. It can grab 50-50 balls. It can do the dirty work you absolutely, positively have to do at the defensive end of the floor to beat an opponent that is ranked 13th in the nation, that was unbeaten at home and that was coming off a 40-point win over another ranked team.
Kentucky did all that and more in its 70-59 takedown of the Auburn Tigers before a sold-out raucous, then panicky, then frustrated and exit-early crowd at Neville Arena.
“Kentucky outplayed us,” Auburn coach Bruce Pearl said afterward as if the comment spoke for itself.
Let the record show, Auburn missed a lot of open shots. The Tigers couldn’t miss in that 101-61 trouncing of South Carolina on Wednesday when the Tigers shot 61% from the floor. Against Kentucky, Auburn shot 30.9%. It missed 18 of its 22 3-point attempts. The Tigers were the baseball team that scores 15 runs in one game and is shut out the next.
Asked if his team simply failed to take advantage of open looks at the basket, however, Pearl wasn’t buying it. “Give Kentucky credit,” the coach said. “Kentucky guarded.”
The Cats did guard. They defended the pick-and-roll. They contested shots around the basket. And when Auburn did miss, the Cats snatched the ball off the glass. Auburn did end up with 14 offensive rebounds, but in 43 opportunities for 32.6%. Compare that to the Saturday before when a victorious Gonzaga grabbed 18 of 37 offensive rebounds for 48.6%.
Calipari likes to imply that the critics have exaggerated his team’s defensive liabilities. (The “Is that your belief or is that your hope?” thing.) The numbers don’t lie, however. Kentucky entered Saturday at No. 105 in adjusted defensive efficiency, according to KenPom. Eleven times this season UK had given up 80 or more points.
Pace of play had something to do with those high numbers. But through the struggles, you wondered why the Cats weren’t better on the defensive end. They certainly possessed the athletic ability, the length, the knowledge of the game. The tools are there.
After UK’s 103-92 loss to Tennessee at Rupp Arena back on Feb. 3, a Tennessee writer asked me if in my long career — I’m old — I had ever seen a team play with so much focus on offense and so little focus on defense?
Saturday, Kentucky had that focus. The Cats were locked in. They had heard the critics. They had read the predictions. They knew all four of the so-called experts from “GameDay” — the term might not apply to Jay Williams — on set at Auburn had picked the Tigers to roll again at home. They were motivated.
“Nobody believed in us,” UK center Ugonna Onyenso afterward said.
The next step is for Calipari’s club to believe that Saturday’s performance is repeatable. Six regular-season games remain. Wednesday brings a road game at LSU, who upset South Carolina 64-63 in Columbia on Saturday. Then Saturday, conference-leader Alabama comes to Lexington. The Crimson Tide not only leads the SEC with a 10-2 record, Nate Oats’ band of explosives has scored 100 or more points eight times this season, including its 100-75 trampling of Texas A&M on Saturday.
Meanwhile, back at Neville, Calipari couldn’t help but crow to the media crowd. Before he even sat down for his press conference, the coach facetiously marveled at the size of the contingent, then told the critics to take their shots at him, not his kids. Before he ended the Q&A, Cal being Cal, he made sure to say he had to rush off to Indianapolis for the NBA All-Star Game where seven of his ex-Cats are participants.
“Do you understand it’s a record?” Calipari said.
A few moments later, there was Pearl leaning back in his chair, facing the same media crowd, rubbing his hand through his graying hair, with nowhere else to go.
“If Kentucky guards like that,” the Auburn coach said, “they can beat anybody.”
Three takeaways from Kentucky basketball’s win at No. 13 Auburn
John Calipari put on a show after UK beat Auburn. The real scene happened out on court.
Kentucky controls No. 13 Auburn from the beginning for biggest win of the season so far
Box score from No. 22 Kentucky basketball’s 70-59 SEC win at No. 13 Auburn
Shot charts from No. 22 Kentucky basketball’s 70-59 win at No. 13 Auburn
