Five things you need to know from Kentucky’s horrid 71-68 loss to South Carolina
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Game day: South Carolina 71, Kentucky 68
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader’s and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Tuesday night’s men’s basketball game between Kentucky and South Carolina in Rupp Arena.
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Five things you need to know from Kentucky’s 71-68 loss to South Carolina in SEC men’s college basketball at Rupp Arena at Central Bank Center:
1. Cats’ Rupp Arena win streak goes bust. South Carolina’s stunning upset, as a 19.5-point underdog and coming off a 43-point home loss to Tennessee, snapped Kentucky’s 28-game home-court winning streak.
The Gamecocks arrived at Rupp Arena ranked No. 263 in the NET rankings.
In the catalog of Calipari era “bad losses,” this falls behind only last season’s stunning defeat to Saint Peter’s in the NCAA Tournament and the 2019-20 home loss to Evansville.
It is another dispiriting defeat that an already-agitated Big Blue Nation will find tough to stomach.
2. No ‘”D” in Kentucky — again. For all the attention that falls on John Calipari’s offensive approach, it was again the UK defense that did in the Cats.
South Carolina managed only 42 points in the entire game in falling 85-42 to Tennessee on Saturday in Columbia. In Rupp, the Gamecocks had 42 — and a 10-point lead — at halftime.
Making a substandard 31.1 percent of its three-point shots on the season entering the game, South Carolina drained 11 of 20 treys against Kentucky.
Junior guard Meechie Johnson — a 31-percent three-point shooter himself entering the game — was unconscious vs. UK. The 6-foot-2, 180-pound junior hit 6 of 10 three-point attempts and 9 of 16 shots overall en route to a game-high 26 points.
Continually, Johnson drained deep threes from way behind the arc to bail South Carolina out as the shot clock ran down.
Kentucky also failed at defensive rebounding. The Wildcats gave up 15 offensive rebounds to South Carolina and UK was outscored 21-12 on second-chance points.
3. UK’s revolving door of roster availability. Kentucky played most of the game without two of its top four scorers on the season.
Jacob Toppin (10.9 points) missed the entire game after suffering a shoulder injury in Saturday’s blowout loss at Alabama.
Freshman guard Cason Wallace (12.1 points entering the contest) played only eight minutes, scoring four points before leaving the game for good with what UK said was a lower-back injury.
UK leading scorer Oscar Tshiebwe (15.7 points entering the game) bounced back from his nightmare in Tuscaloosa with 19 points and 12 rebounds.
Meanwhile, guard CJ Fredrick returned from the finger issue that sidelined him to play well, scoring 14 points on 6-of-9 shooting.
But it turned out a short-handed UK playing at home didn’t have enough to beat the team perceived to be the SEC’s weakest.
4. Free throws kill Cats. As many things as went wrong for UK, the Cats might have survived had they made foul shots.
They didn’t.
In a game Kentucky ultimately lost by three, UK went 7-for-14 from the foul line.
5. UK vs. Power Five foes. Kentucky is now 29-29 against major-conference (the football Power Five plus the Big East) dating to the final week of the 2019-20 season.
This story was originally published January 10, 2023 at 9:20 PM.
