‘Another statement game for us.’ Clara Strack leads No. 14 Kentucky past No. 19 Illinois.
Likely, few college sophomores are having a better week than Clara Strack.
She took a trip to Nashville for the Music City Classic, saw her team’s record extend to 7-0 and celebrated her birthday on Wednesday with a career-high 25 points and career-high-tying 15 rebounds in No. 14 Kentucky’s 76-53 victory against No. 19 Illinois.
“You’ve gotta come play every day,” Strack said. “We knew this was going to be a really big game for us. We knew this could be another statement game for us, so I think we all just came to play.”
Strack, who also finished with four assists, one steal and one block, recorded her fourth double-double of the season against the Illini. Kenny Brooks said the Wildcats’ leading scorer, who spent the majority of her freshman campaign behind All-America center Liz Kitley at Virginia Tech last season, is hungry for improvement.
“We knew she had that ability last year,” Brooks said. “She stepped in, in the postseason in the biggest stage and performed extremely well. And we knew she had the capabilities, but what I didn’t know coming in was how hungry she was gonna be. And right from the get-go, the day she walked on campus, she was chomping at the bit wanting to be great. Wanting to be great. And I challenge her all the time. So proud of what she did.”
Against Illinois, Strack was the only Wildcat to create any consistent offensive momentum for four quarters. After a first half that ended in a 28-28 tie, Strack had 13 points and nine rebounds. At the 7:25 mark of the third period — when Illinois head coach Shauna Green called a timeout after Strack capped off a 6-0 UK scoring run in less than 90 seconds — Strack had 17 points and 10 rebounds; she was the only UK player to have scored more than six at that point in the matchup.
Though Strack did stuff the stat sheet, Brooks was especially pleased with what didn’t show up in the numbers.
“She had 25 and 15, but she’s anchoring our defense,” Brooks said. “She allows me to be able to switch, and she can switch off on a guard and guard just as well as our guards do. So that makes us very versatile, but she was special tonight.”
Illinois (6-1), the reigning WBIT champion, is a tough and talented veteran team with a high-profile ranked win over then-No. 19 Florida State back on Nov. 7. And, for much of Wednesday’s game, Illinois gave the Wildcats all they could handle — leading to a particularly lopsided statistic, the nature of which Brooks said was completely new to him.
Through four quarters, UK committed 19 personal fouls and watched as Illinois sank 20 of 27 from the free-throw line. Conversely, the Illini committed 12 fouls but only sent Kentucky to the line twice. UK finished with one made free-throw on just two attempts.
“I’ve never in my life been associated with a game like that,” Brooks said, “where the discrepancy was that large, and you win by 23 points. We have to do a better job. We’re just not a downhill-driving team. We’ll pass the ball; downhill-driving teams, they usually don’t have a lot of assists. We normally have a lot of assists during our game, that’s the way we play. So it’s a little bit of a trade-off.
“I thought we could’ve gotten a couple calls where we could’ve gotten to the free-throw line, but it’s kind of one of those games where, I’m not an analytics guy, and that’s why. Because analytics would’ve probably said, ‘You’re gonna lose that game, doing that.’ But I’m just proud of our kids playing through whatever was happening, all the adversity.”
The Illini took just nine shots on nine Kentucky fouls in the second half, and, particularly in the fourth quarter, UK came alive. The Wildcats entered the final 10 minutes of the game with a 50-44 advantage and proceeded to outscore Illinois 26-9.
Graduate guard Dazia Lawrence finished with 15 points, one rebound and two steals after scoring only three points in the first half. Junior forwards Teonni Key and Amelia Hassett each scored six points in the fourth quarter. Key finished with 12 points, 10 rebounds, three assists and three blocks. Hassett tacked on 10 points, nine rebounds and one assist.
Strack said Brooks’ halftime message was to “make your shots,” and to “step up and do what you do, and do it with confidence.”
“Honestly, the shots started falling,” Strack said. “We know we can shoot, we know we can make those plays that we did in the second half. So I think our shots just started falling, we started feeling ourselves, so it just kept us rolling.”
Not counting Strack’s attempts, UK shot 7-for-23 in the first half; only one of those seven makes was a 3-pointer. That stat increased to 16 makes on 33 attempts (again, excluding Strack’s production) in the second half.
“I’m gonna state the obvious here,” Brooks said. “When we make shots, we’re really good. And, I mean, we got some of the same looks in the first half. We just fell short and didn’t shoot it very well. And when we start shooting the ball like we’re capable of, it’s gonna add an element to us that we haven’t really displayed yet, and it’s gonna make us even better. It’s gonna open up a lot of different things for us.”
The Wildcats have a bit of a break between the conclusion of the Music City Classic and their Dec. 5 road game against No. 16 North Carolina, but don’t worry — they’ll have the opportunity to celebrate Thanksgiving on Thursday. But first, of course, there’s a detailed film session covering both Wednesday’s win against Illinois and Tuesday’s win over Arizona State.
“This is something that people don’t really understand,” Brooks said. “The sacrifices that these kids make away from their families. So we’re gonna watch film tomorrow on both of the games; I might let them bring popcorn. And then we’re gonna have Thanksgiving dinner. We’re going to have Thanksgiving dinner together, and then we’ll practice on Friday and, it’s kind of a blessing, they’ll get a weekend off. They’ll get a weekend off where they can kind of be a kid for a little bit.”
The Wildcats will return to practice on Monday ahead of the Thursday matchup with the Tar Heels (6-1) in the ACC/SEC Challenge in Chapel Hill.
Next up
No. 14 Kentucky vs. No. 16 North Carolina
What: ACC/SEC Challenge
When: 8 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 5
Where: Chapel Hill, N.C.
TV: ESPN2
Radio: WLAP-AM 630
Records: UK 7-0, North Carolina 6-1
Series: North Carolina leads 3-1
Last meeting: UK won 85-75 in the Paradise Jam tournament championship in St. Thomas, Virgin Islands, on Nov. 24, 2018
