‘We’ve got a good team.’ John Calipari discusses what went right and what went wrong.

The Kentucky Wildcats lost their first game of the 2022-23 season on Tuesday night, falling in double overtime to Michigan State inside Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis as part of the annual Champions Classic.

The dramatic game featured the season debut of star UK big man Oscar Tshiebwe, a standout defensive performance from freshman guard Cason Wallace and numerous late-game mistakes by the Wildcats that cost Kentucky a win.

Postgame, UK head coach John Calipari met with members of the media and addressed all of this, and more.

Here’s everything Calipari had to say after the Wildcats’ loss to the Spartans:

Q. Did you have any set idea about how much you were going to play Oscar today?

I said to him before, ‘You can sub yourself in and out, and if you’re not subbing yourself I’ll take you out.’ Somebody hit me and said, ‘You have him on a minutes restriction?’ I said, ‘Yeah, as many as he can play.’ I mean, we just played a really good team. I saw Tommy (Izzo) in the hallway and I just said, ‘You were more prepared to finish a game off than we were.’

We missed free throws where we could have separated. But we rebounded better ... in transition where in the first step they had seven points. We didn’t get a point in transition. Second half, we got more than they got. We did enough to win the game. But we were discombobulated at times. We’re making calls and, we just haven’t practiced together.

Some of the late game stuff. You know, again, we’ve had three guys out that you expect to play and give them credit. They did what they had to, they made like every free throw. And we come down one out of two, one out of two and hard to win a game that way, but out-of-bounds play, was just something we never do. And we left a man, he was under the basket.

But that’s all stuff that I’m fine. For Oscar to do what he did without playing for four weeks and never practice? Come on. That’s ridiculous. And Cason, I thought really played well. I played him too many minutes. And when Oscar went with the fifth foul, I was going to go more with Antonio (Reeves) but I had to leave Cason in and then I’m thinking OK, what do we do? You know, hindsight is maybe play him and let him just go get baskets for you, which he can do ...

We fought, we battled, we put ourselves in a position to win. And they knew they missed free throws and I said, ‘Look, guys, at the end of the day. We’ve got a good team. You play veteran teams, like we got games coming up against really good veteran kind of teams. You’ve got to finish people off. That means make free throws. That means total execution.’ You know, the game plan was we’re not leaving (Joey) Hauser. We left Hauser. I’m like, in the huddle ... There is no excuse. Why did you leave him? Then I had to take one guy out because I had been saying it every day and he ...

So that stuff when you get together as a team. That focus will be better. And so now we go forward. Tomorrow’s practice will be video and then we’ll play a game and then we got to travel to Spokane. But I’m glad we played in this game we learned a lot about our team and you know to go double overtime like I’m exhausted right now. Go double overtime this early in the year in that environment. And then had to do it without Oscar made it, you know, a tough go.

Q. What needs to happen for this team to be what it needs to be offensively?

Well, here’s what I liked. We couldn’t make threes, yet we were going to win the game. That means you’re doing all the other stuff you need to do.

But we’re a team that’s got to get baskets in transition. We got to get baskets from the three-point line. And as we get better with Oscar, we tried to do too much passing from the wing in which crowds it, there’s got to be more passes from the middle third in, so they can’t really trap him. If they do, you’re giving up shots, so things that we’ve got to work on.

But we need to be a team that’s scoring 80 a game, and then defensively I think we’re good enough and rebounding we’re good enough to put ourselves in a position to win.

Q. Do you need Oscar to be a playmaker passing out of the post?

He had some turnovers. There were a couple things I thought he could have kicked out but come on, man, (he) can’t do everything. Like even the play out of bounds, I’ve got to you know ...

He was carrying us for a while and that happens. I got a lot to learn about our team and I thought these guys fought like heck. When you talk about late-game situation, that’s on me as a coach. Let’s go. Let’s figure this out. Now I come back and say we just haven’t been together to do it. I haven’t had our team together.

Q. Defensively, Cason was everywhere. What did you like from him tonight?

That’s why I didn’t take him out. He was getting steals, he was rebounding. He had that foul. He reverted to high school, ‘I’m going to go and take this from you.’ No, you don’t do that in college. So he went up, and boom foul and the kid makes two, you know and stuff like that.

But when you talk about what he did, and the difference, the impact he had on the game, it was enormous. He’s a good player. But here’s the other thing, I had guys, whether it was Ugo (Onyenso), Damion (Collins), Chris (Livingston), Antonio. Normally, they’re playing more but what happened was you get into a rhythm and you’re like, ‘OK, let’s stick with this.’ And I only made subs, you’re riding a team that’s doing what they’re doing.

So we just, like I said, I got a full group of guys that all can play. We’re just going to go from here.

Q. What did Michigan State do to make it difficult for Kentucky shooters?

There were shots our guys did not take like we were, one was 1-for-7, the other was 2-for-7. But there were shots we didn’t take. My thing is look, you’ve got to shoot them. You got to make that play. And if you don’t, we’ll rebound your miss. I mean, some of our turnovers were based on, you have an open shot and you’re not taking it.

But they also went this way. And then they were kind of beating on Oscar. You know what I’m saying? We’ll go one just foul them, if they don’t call the foul great. And they just you know, and now all of a sudden the kid’s you know, fighting for his life down there one-on-one and then it takes away some of these other guys I think that’s what Tommy was trying to do.

You’ve got to get baskets in transition. You got to fly it ahead, you got to throw it and go in the lane, but they’re a physical team. And they play physical, they do. And, you know, it was exciting for everybody watching it. It just wasn’t exciting for me, at the end, I mean everybody watched it and says, ‘What a great game. That was something double overtime. Yeah.’ No.

Q. John, how many guys have you coached that can miss a month and come out and play the way Oscar did?

I coached this guy, Superman, in Memphis. He had arthroscopic surgery. He was out four weeks. They say it could be six weeks. After watching him practice I said, ‘I think you should have played last week, which would have been three weeks.’ And he wants a win in the worst way. You know?

We got a lot of stuff to figure out. We really do. But I like this team. I like us defensively. I like us rebounding. I like us shooting, playmaking, a lot of good stuff. We weren’t ready and I told everybody, we’re not ready for teams that are ready to finish off the end of a game. We’re not, and that’s on me. I mean, Lance (Ware) even said, ‘Coach, we haven’t worked on this,’ Maryland and Touchdown and plays with four and five seconds to go because we haven’t had time and we haven’t had the team here.

So now I’m doing it with five guys in the fourth. So some of it is on me. And a game like this you look at it and say ‘OK, they executed better than us,’ and they did. That comes back to me again.

Q. What did you think about the play of Michigan State’s Mady Sissoko?

Unbelievable, and then they got a guy they can throw lobs to, which are my guys, how we usually play and I was trying to get guys to the rim. Damion had a couple opportunities for lobs, one we threw off the shot clock, the other we didn’t throw.

So again, we got so much work to do to just settle down and get into ‘Here’s who we are.’ But that’s the fun part of coaching. I mean I told you guys these are the games you want to play. These are the games you want to play. Let’s find out who we are. Our schedule’s ridiculous ... so let’s go out and regroup.

This story was originally published November 16, 2022 at 7:57 AM.

Cameron Drummond

Lexington Herald-Leader

859-242-5257

Cameron Drummond works as a sports reporter for the Lexington Herald-Leader with a focus on Kentucky men’s basketball recruiting and the UK men’s basketball team, horse racing, soccer and other sports in Central Kentucky. Drummond is a second-generation American who was born and raised in Texas, before graduating from Indiana University. He is a fluent Spanish speaker who previously worked as a community news reporter in Austin, Texas. Support my work with a digital subscription