UK Basketball: What I Saw vs Portland!

ukfreak00
WT Member

What I Saw vs. Portland

The Positives -

• This team is way ahead of where our freshmen were a year ago. While we obviously don't have the athleticism that we had a year ago, this seems to be gelling much quicker than a year ago.
• The basketball IQ for this team is off the charts. This early last year, we were still seeing very questionable decisions from our Freshmen, especially Bledsoe and Cousins, and even Wall at times. We are making far less mental mistakes.
• Josh Harrellson - 6 points, 12 rebounds. He is buying what Coach Calipari is selling. He's not flashy, and he won't show up big in the box score, but I love what I saw out of Harrellson tonight. He's completely happy with anchoring down the middle, grabbing boards, and picking up some garbage points on offensive rebounds and loose balls.
• Terrence Jones - He started off slow, with only 2 points in the first half. A lot of freshmen will let a slow start disrupt the rest of their game. Jones stuck with his game, didn't question himself, and ended up with a solid game with 12 points, 5 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 blocks.
• Speaking of Terrence Jones, I absolutely loved how he reacted to Coach Calipari taking him out of the game after the situation under the basket. We all saw DeMarcus Cousins last year, pout and throw fits after something like that. Jones, went over, sat on the bench, cooled down. He showed a lot of maturity there.
• And, speaking of the situation under the basket, I believe it was DeAndre Liggins who came over, and cooled down Jones immediately after it happened. I've been very hard on Liggins during his time at Kentucky, but I can now say he's becoming one of my favorite players on this team. I've never seen a player accept his new role the way Liggins has, and that speaks volumes for Calipari as a coach.
• Liggins is one of the best defenders in the country. Completely shut down Stohl last night. One of the best shooters in the country, and Liggins never let him get into a rhythm, and limited him to 9 points on 2 of 9 shooting. You can't say enough about the defensive performance put on by DeAndre last night. It won't show up in the box score, but Liggins is the key to this team. We will go as far as Liggins takes us. His ability to take a teams main offensive threat away is such a great thing to have.
• Brandon Knight is the "quietest" scorer I have seen in a long time. What I mean by that is, if you didn't see the box score, and you didn't keep track of Knight's points, you would have never guess Brandon put up 21 points last night. The kid is special.
• We can shoot the basketball! How refreshing is that to hear after last years 3 point struggles? 8-18 last night. 3-4 from Daron Lamb, 3-4 for Darius Miller, and 2-5 from Brandon Knight. I also love that we are hitting the guy trailing on fast breaks for wide open 3's a lot. Any 3 pointer in transition is a huge momentum boost.
• Darius Miller is much improved from last year. He has the confidence that I have never seen from Miller. What a stat line last night. 15 points, 5 rebounds, 4 assists, 5 steals, and 4 blocks. Again, the improvement from Darius Miller just shows what a great coach Calipari is.
• We have quick hands on defense. We're always looking for the steal. Going to have a lot of fast break points this year.

The negatives -

• Terrence Jones absolutely has to stop being so quick to pull the trigger on the 3 point shot. He only shot two last night, but they were two bad shots. His best game is the mid-range game, 10-15 feet from the basket, use it!
• Eloy Vargas. I knew he wasn't going to put up huge numbers, and I'm fine with that. But, he looks like he never has any idea where he's supposed to be on the offensive end of the court.
• Stacey Poole. I understand he's buried behind a lot of talent, but what is this guy doing wrong in practice that he can only get 2 minutes, at the end of the game, when we're playing 4 games in 6 days, and we only have 10 guys dressed, including Polson?
• Lack of depth. If Stacey Poole can't at least be a role player for this team, we are in serious trouble here. 10 guys played last night, but of them, Poole had 2 minutes, and Polson had 2 minutes, in a 31 point blowout, so you can't expect them to contribute in close games. How far can we go with an 8 man rotation?
• I saw Darius Miller get lazy a few times on the defensive end. I don't like to see guys rest on the defensive end of the court. This is not like Darius Miller, but it is a negative from last night that I need to point out. I saw a few times where Miller failed to close out on a jump shooter and instead lazily jogged towards him. I will give Darius the benefit of the doubt that it won't happen again, but it was a concern last night.

- Overall, I was very impressed with the things we were able to do last night. As you know, going into this match-up, I was very concerned. That was a good Portland team we just beat on the road. I'm very pleased with that we have been able to do this year so far. Now, on to Maui!