Calipari hopes ‘tweak’ will steady a wobbly UK team again

The tweak is back. And if all goes well for Kentucky, the peak will follow again.

Following the example of two seasons ago, UK Coach John Calipari announced Monday that he had “tweaked” his team’s approach. As in 2014, he declined to identify the tweak (or tweaks) and taunted reporters to identify any change in future games, presumably beginning Tuesday night at Florida.

“It’s not a wholesale change from what we do,” he said. “You Basketball Bennies will have an idea of what I did. Most of you in this room have no idea of what I tweaked. But the people who really follow it (and) study it, will say (there it is).”

As the 2013-14 season seemed to be unraveling as February turned to March, Calipari teased everyone for weeks about the “tweak.” The mystery grew as Kentucky turned its season around and made a stunning run to the Final Four.

Ever the marketer, Calipari later revealed the tweak in his book titled Players First. The tweak? He instructed point guard Andrew Harrison to pass to the perimeter after penetrating the defense rather than forcing up a shot. When Aaron Harrison repeatedly made clutch three-pointers that postseason Calipari’s Coaching 101 suggestion looked like the stuff of genius.

Calipari made no claim that the latest tweak would be more revolutionary. He seemed to suggest the change had less to do with X-and-O strategy, and more to do with m-i-n-d games.

“It’s too late to change how we play,” he said. “But there’s no reason we can’t have a confident basketball team, and that’s what we should have.”

On a Southeastern Conference teleconference earlier Monday, Calipari hit on the theme of confidence-building.

“We’ve got some guys we just have to help them build confidence,” he said. “Teach them to assert themselves.”

Kentucky’s loss at Vanderbilt on Saturday made it seem likely that Calipari saw the need to boost the confidence of UK’s big men.

While Jamal Murray (33 points) and Tyler Ulis (12 points, six assists) did their customary yeoman’s work, UK’s big men did not contribute — in Calipari’s word — anything. Alex Poythress, Skal Labissiere and Isaac Humphries did not score. The three combined for five rebounds.

Kentucky will be “trying to put people in position where they can be more confident,” Calipari said. “ . . . You’ve just got to assert yourself and make plays. I told the big guys that you’ve just got to figure out ways as we’re playing. Whether you can post. You can get (baskets) in transition. You’ve got to assert yourself.”

Throughout his seven seasons as Kentucky coach, Calipari has stressed that confidence must come through “demonstrated performance.” He has said again and again that happy talk by a coach cannot instill confidence in a player.

Calipari suggested coaches can help bring about the demonstrated performance by putting the players in a favorable position for success.

“You’ve got to help them and say, ‘Here’s how you do this,’” the UK coach said. “‘Within what we’re doing, let’s think about this.’

“That’s what tweaking is.”

And, Calipari added, the focus of this latest tweaking is not solely on UK’s big men.

When asked about Isaiah Briscoe’s shooting (one of 20 from three-point range since Dec. 19), Calipari said, “There are things we can do to help him, too. And we will.”

Calipari did not disagree with the suggestion that this year’s tweak or tweaks include a mental component.

“Some of it is mental,” he said. “But the other part is you’re changing how they think about playing. You’re changing the mentality of how they’re doing this.”

The bottom line sounded like Kentucky needs to find help for Ulis and Murray.

Ulis denied that he tired at Vanderbilt. In the second half, he made one of nine shots (zero for five from three-point range).

“I was fine,” he said. “I just had an off shooting night.”

Murray looked exhausted, especially late in the first half when he asked to be taken out of the game.

Coincidentally or not, Ulis and Murray went into last weekend averaging the most and second most minutes of any SEC player in league games: Ulis 37.2 minutes and Murray 35.9. At Vandy, Ulis played 39 minutes and Murray 37.

“We just can’t play through one or two guys,” Calipari said. “You can in a game. A guy gets going (like Murray at Vandy). Just let him play.

“You can’t every game. It’s not how I coach, and it’s not how you win at the highest level.”

This story was originally published February 29, 2016 at 5:20 PM with the headline "Calipari hopes ‘tweak’ will steady a wobbly UK team again."