Why Kentucky basketball could be sitting on a big advantage for March Madness
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Game day: No. 8 Kentucky 96, Illinois State 70
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader’s and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Friday’s men’s basketball game between Kentucky and Illinois State in Rupp Arena.
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Any chance Illinois State had of “pulling off the Wilmington” and stunning No. 8 Kentucky on Friday night at Rupp Arena ran into a harsh reality:
Against the plucky Redbirds, all four members of UK’s highly talented guard rotation played well. When that happens, defeating the Wildcats is going to be a Herculean task for any foe.
“They are really hard to guard,” Illinois State coach Ryan Pedon said of Kentucky following his team’s 96-70 loss to the Wildcats. “They play really selfless. That ball moves. They are tremendous in transition.”
Before a sellout crowd of 20,659, UK’s four-headed backcourt was a full participant in the “light up Rupp” promotion. Super-senior Antonio Reeves made 10 of 15 shots and dropped 27 points on his former team.
Among the three freshmen, Rob Dillingham was three assists away from a double-double with 16 points and seven dimes. D.J. Wagner made 6 of 10 shots, 2 of 3 treys, and had 14 points. Reed Sheppard was his usual stat-stuffing self with 11 points, five rebounds, five assists, two steals and two blocked shots.
“Reed Sheppard is the real deal. He’s the real deal, man,” Pedon said. “To me, he separates them from, maybe, some of the past years when they didn’t have a guy like Reed Sheppard.”
Looking forward, the reasons for optimism that Kentucky can advance past the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2019 start with the four high-level guards UK has at its disposal. When you have a quartet of good guards, it would seem you are almost certain to get quality perimeter play from multiple players in any given game.
That reality should mean less game pressure on individuals.
“For sure, it takes pressure off so much,” Dillingham said. “The spotlight is not on me, and it’s always been (on me) through high school. Now, it’s like playing with all these dudes, I don’t have to do as much. I can just pass the ball and I don’t even have to have a stat (yet) I am contributing by helping them.”
Of the dynamic of playing in a backcourt with three other elite performers, Wagner said “it makes it a lot easier out there for all of us, knowing that the next person you pass it to is going to make a play or the next person you pass it to is going to make the right play. I won’t say (there is less) pressure. I don’t even know what I would call it, but it just makes the game a lot easier, a lot funner. We all like sharing the ball with each other and seeing each other play good.”
You will recall that, by the end of last season, Kentucky had only five players making regular contributions. When two of those five combined to shoot 2-for-22 in an NCAA Tournament game, the Cats were bounced in the round of 32 by Kansas State.
This year, “when you have choices now, you start rotating them in, and if somebody is having a tough day, we can still win, so don’t worry,” Kentucky coach John Calipari said. “Now, it’s not on you, it’s on us. Go play your best. Go play harder than them, go have a ball. If you get it rolling, you play. If someone else has it rolling, they’ll play.”
What will prove interesting as Kentucky moves into conference play is what will UK’s “success equation” look like as the season progresses? So far in 2023-24, the Wildcats have been vulnerable when they have had fewer than three of their four main guards playing at a high level.
Against then-No. 1 Kansas in the Champion’s Classic, Dillingham (18 points in 16 minutes, 4-for-5 3-point shooting) and Sheppard (13 points in 15 minutes, 3-for-4 3-point shooting) played well, but Reeves (24 points, but 7-for-25 shooting, 3-for-17 on treys) and Wagner (1-for-12 shooting, four points) did not. The result was an 89-84 come-from-ahead UK loss.
When UNC Wilmington dropped an 80-73 stunner on Kentucky at Rupp, Sheppard (25 points, nine rebounds, six assists, two steals) and Reeves (14 points on 5-for-9 shooting) played well. Dillingham, however, went 1-for-9 and scored only two points while Wagner did not play at all due to injury.
Conversely, when Kentucky survived an overtime challenge from Saint Joseph’s, Wagner (22 points), Reeves (20) and Dillingham (13) all scored in double figures. When UK defeated then-No. 9 North Carolina on a neutral court, the three freshmen guards — Dillingham (17 points), Wagner (14) and Sheppard (11) — came up big.
In the hard games so far, at least three guards playing well has been Kentucky’s magic number.
Obviously, if UK’s frontcourt develops a consistent performer to supplement Tre Mitchell’s contributions, Kentucky’s need for a 75% “backcourt proficiency quotient” to win the tough ones might lessen.
As it is, rather than parsing how the Wildcats’ backcourt minutes are being divided, UK backers should be supporting the idea of getting all four of UK’s primary guards playing consistently well by March.
As Illinois State discovered Friday night, Kentucky is highly difficult to defeat when all four of its guards are “on.”
This story was originally published December 30, 2023 at 10:40 AM.
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