Mark Pope describes how Kentucky basketball won a wild SEC road game at Oklahoma
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Game day: No. 17 Kentucky 83, Oklahoma 82
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Wednesday night’s men’s basketball game between Kentucky and Oklahoma in Norman, Okla.
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No. 17 Kentucky men’s basketball got back in the win column Wednesday night, winning a wild and wacky 83-82 decision at Oklahoma in the program’s first trip to Norman.
The headline-maker from the game was UK junior guard Otega Oweh. Against his former school, Oweh scored a career-best 28 points. He scored 23 of those points in the second half, including the final 18 of the game for Mark Pope’s team.
During the final 12:50 of the game, Oweh was the only UK player to make a shot from the field. This included the game-winner with just six seconds to go, which saw Oweh muscle his way into the lane and send a right-handed hook shot off the glass and in.
For good measure, Oweh then raced down the other end of the floor and helped disrupt star Oklahoma guard Jeremiah Fears as he tried to win the game himself at the buzzer.
Aside from Oweh, the only other UK player to score in double figures was sophomore center Brandon Garrison, an Oklahoma native who spent last season at Oklahoma State. Garrison had 12 points, four rebounds and three blocks and steals each. Garrison’s eventful night also included being part of a chaotic postgame scene with Oklahoma players and nearly being hit with an object thrown from the crowd as UK players left the floor.
Wednesday’s game also marked the return of fifth-year guards Lamont Butler and Jaxson Robinson to game action for the Wildcats after dealing with left shoulder (Butler) and right wrist (Robinson) injuries.
Butler had seven points, six assists, four rebounds and three turnovers in 20 minutes. He fouled out with 4:16 left in the game. Butler led UK players with a plus-10.
Robinson, also an Oklahoma native, had seven points on 3-for-7 shooting in 12 minutes. He didn’t play in the second half.
It wasn’t the most stylish win for Kentucky, but it was certainly a needed one. The Cats are now 19-9 overall and 8-7 in SEC play, with No. 1 Auburn coming to Lexington on Saturday afternoon.
Before that, though, Pope met with media members in Norman to recap Wednesday night’s insanity.
Here’s everything the UK coach said.
Opening statement
What a great atmosphere it was in here tonight. And what a great effort by Oklahoma. They’re scratching and clawing and just coming off a really big win for them.
They played really, really hard and I was proud of our guys. Again, we’re dancing with all kinds of weirdness with our lineups... But I’m proud of how our guys responded and especially these two guys (Otega Oweh and Brandon Garrison) I thought were absolutely terrific tonight.
Question about Otega Oweh’s offensive performance late in the game.
Well, we get in this weird space where we’re just in this weird lineup space. So we had no timeouts left, we’re just trying to figure all that out. So we had kind of run-in after our last timeout, kind of a 2-4-5 ram where we were going to either use it or reject it and we had BG (Brandon Garrison) popping and BG had already made a couple 3s so he was dangerous.
Otega getting downhill has been really incredible, and both those guys made great decisions down the stretch, and made big-time plays to get it done.
So that was kind of the nuts and bolts of the end of the game.
Question about about how injuries and different lineups affect Kentucky’s offensive rhythm.
Listen... We talked about it in our shootaround today, and we talked about it before the game. There’s a lot of weirdness going into this game.
We had really a roster transformation with those two guys coming back because then I have two guys that are actually probably going out of the rotation from starting spots. And then there were other changes and a first game back, and health, and then the foul issues, both bigs in foul trouble early in the game and then Lamont fouling out.
It’s just all this stuff, right. We talked about this at shootaround and we talked about it before the game, that this had all of the makings of a first-round NCAA (Tournament) game. All of the makings. All the weirdness, there was weirdness especially with (Oweh and Garrison) coming home, it was a late start, we had this roster turnover, it was a really different environment. This is a different environment in this gym. and all those things.
So the guys were terrific at anticipating the frustration. I thought the game got really interesting. I think we got down six or seven and it was kind of this turning point (for) our guys, and then just rallied. We’re trying to capture that and roll into postseason play really with a huge focus on this specific game that meant something to us.
It’s nice that we had guys make incredible plays on both sides of the ball to finish it. So we get to experience this and chase it again.
Question about if winning at Oklahoma could help Kentucky find some consistency late in the regular season.
I don’t know how it plays with momentum. I think there were some questions just about the chippiness of the game. It’s that time of year. Like, we’re just (at) that time of year guys.
We’re down to the final few games and then its postseason play. So, I don’t know if it’s momentum. But I do think our guys captured a little added experience tonight that they will call back on when we get in a very similar game. So I love that. I love that we have that in our pocket.
Question about Jaxson Robinson’s right wrist injury and Andrew Carr’s back injury.
Jax’s wrist, it didn’t respond great tonight. So we’ll see how that is going forward.
I think Andrew’s doing OK. I think he’s OK. I think Lamont is OK. We’ll see. For us moving forward, it’s always the morning after that we’re going to know a lot more.
Question about the process of having Lamont Butler and Jaxson Robinson play against Oklahoma.
Lamont’s been actually pretty good the last week, 10 days maybe, back to where he was before we threw him out last time. So we were just in this waiting space where it’s just like, ‘He’s moving great.’ The limited movement on the court, you might notice, is because his brace (on Butler’s left shoulder) is so tight right now trying to keep him together.
I think the thing was, there’s four games left, it was kind of like a good runway for him to kind of find himself back into this. This game means something to us here at Oklahoma, it means something to Jax, too, and I think he was excited to get out here and try it.
I think both those guys were dying to get back on the floor. They had both been cleared...
Question about Oklahoma freshman guard Jeremiah Fears.
You love guards who can get wherever they want on the court. And he can get wherever he wants on the court pretty consistently. I think his last two games, I don’t know what he ended up with today in terms of assists (six), but his 10-assist game (on Saturday against Mississippi State), he gets really special.
He was six assists tonight, he has 16 assists in the last two games, that’s pretty special. And he’s doing it by causing a lot of havoc, right?
I think he’s a really special talent. He’s a good player.
This story was originally published February 27, 2025 at 12:59 AM.
