What do you know, Kentucky’s shooters have turned into makers
When you talk about a team that just could not shoot the three-pointer, you’re talking about these Kentucky Wildcats, the 2020-21 edition of cumulative rock-throwers who shot the basketball like the rim was a constantly moving target.
So what did John Calipari tell his team?
“Keep shooting,” said the coach.
And shooting. And shooting. And shooting some more. Before practice. In practice. After practice. And in games. Especially in games. Don’t be scared. Don’t be deterred. Shoot the ball!!!!
And now, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, out of the deep blue, these Cats are starting to make those very same shots.
In Saturday’s 82-80 barn burner of a win over Bruce Pearl and the visiting Auburn Tigers, the Cats were 11-for-24 from three-point land, including a sizzling 8-for-13 in the second half. That followed a feverish 14-for-26 three-point effort in Tuesday’s one-point loss to Arkansas.
That’s a combined 25 made three-point shots in back-to-back games, the most made threes by a UK team in consecutive games since March 7 and 8 of 1998. (Tubby Smith’s national title team with Jeff Sheppard, Scott Padgett, Cameron Mills, etc.) This from a team that would have previously needed five, six, maybe more games to witness 25 three-pointers pass through the hoop.
What changed?
“Nothing really changed,” freshman Brandon Boston said Saturday. “We’ve just been consistently getting up a lot of shots, focusing on our craft.”
Easy for BJ to say, since Boston pulled a Steph Curry imitation, making five of his eight three-point attempts Saturday on the way to 17 points. Davion Mintz was two of six from three, but one of the two was the biggest shot of the game, a triple from the right of the key with 32 seconds left that put the Cats up 80-77.
Devin Askew, Olivier Sarr, Keion Brooks and Dontaie Allen all got in on the act, hitting a three-pointer each. That’s 11 made three-pointers from six different Cats.
“What have I been telling these guys?” Calipari said when asked about the improvement, and who loves nothing better than to use his postgame media sessions as a pop quiz.
Answer: Miss your first five, take five more. And maybe five more after that. The Calipari manifesto: If you go 0-for-10, “If anybody says anything, that’s not on you, that’s on me. Shoot the ball!!!!”
The biggest problem was the act of passing up of good shots in fear of a missed shot. There is such a thing as being too unselfish. Plus, you just got the feeling Cal’s players did not quite trust their coach, that they believed that surely if a shot is missed, or another, or another after that, the hook was coming.
Basketball Bennie principle: Passing up an open shot leads to a turnover, or a bad shot. And putting up a bad shot leads to a fast break the other way. Take an open shot, or a good shot, and (a) it might actually go in the basket or (b) your teammate might get the rebound or (c) your team is in better position to get back on defense and stop the opponents’ fast break.
“I’ve told these guys, ‘You’re a good player, you can make these shots,’” Calipari said Saturday.
Now, they are playing they actually believe it. After all, shooting less than 30 percent from three-point range as a team can take a mental toll. But seeing that ball go through the basket can build confidence, especially when it does so consistently. What’s that called? Oh yeah, demonstrated performance.
Example: When Mintz got in position to take that three-pointer with 32 seconds left, a shot he took in transition, in rhythm and within the flow of the game, you just knew it was going down. And it did.
So where are the Cats going now? Well, they’re headed to Vanderbilt on Wednesday and Tennessee on Saturday. But they go as a more confident team, one that pulled out a much-needed win Saturday, one that can finally make some shots and score some points. From that comes hope.
