Five things you need to know from No. 9 UK’s frustrating 74-69 loss at Vanderbilt
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Game day: Vanderbilt 74, No. 9 Kentucky 69
Click below for more of the Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Saturday’s men’s basketball game between Kentucky and Vanderbilt in Nashville, Tennessee.
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Five things you need to know from No. 9 Kentucky’s agonizing 74-69 loss at Vanderbilt in SEC men’s basketball:
1. Carr is parked. Kentucky played without super-senior power forward Andrew Carr, who has been battling back problems in recent weeks.
The absence of Carr hurt UK badly in two stretches of the game.
Late in the first half, with Kentucky playing some exotic lineups in Carr’s absence, UK fell behind 41-27 at halftime.
After Otega Oweh sparked a mammoth second-half comeback that saw UK take a 58-51 advantage, not having Carr disrupted Kentucky’s normal “close out the game” routine.
UK was up 69-68 and had the ball as the game drew near the 2:00 mark, but Kentucky subsequently had a turnover-filled meltdown (see below).
Often in 2024-25, it has been Carr who has made plays late to allow Kentucky to close out tight victories.
2. Cats finally succumb to “Memorial Magic.” Kentucky’s defeat snapped an eight-game winning streak for the Wildcats against Vanderbilt in Memorial Gymnasium.
Until Saturday, Vandy’s most recent win over UK on the Commodores’ home court was 74-62 on Feb. 27, 2016.
3. Lack of ball security sinks the Cats. Entering Saturday’s game, Vanderbilt was 11th in NCAA Division I men’s hoops in steals, averaging 9.9 a game. The Commodores were sixth in the country in turnover margin at plus 5.6.
Conversely, UK was 147th in turnover margin at plus 0.9.
On Saturday, Vandy was credited with 10 steals. The Commodores forced 17 Kentucky turnovers while losing the ball only five times themselves.
Two turnover-filled stretches doomed Kentucky.
The Wildcats were up 22-21 with 7:49 left in the first half only to turn the ball over seven times while being outscored 20-5 over the remainder of the half.
Then with the outcome hanging in the balance in the final two minutes of half two, Kentucky turned the ball over with 1:30 left, with 48 seconds left and with one second left.
4. Oweh puts up a big fight. In defeat, Otega Oweh played, perhaps, the best game of his Kentucky career.
The transfer from Oklahoma had a double-double, 21 points and 12 rebounds, while also chipping in three assists and a steal.
Oweh scored 17 of his points in the second half, and led a 31-10 UK charge that turned the 41-27 halftime deficit into a 58-51 UK lead with 8:38 left in the game.
The 6-foot-4, 215-pound Oweh also scored eight of the final 11 Kentucky points in the game.
However, with UK clinging to a 69-68 lead, an Oweh 3-pointer from the left wing rimmed in and out and Vanderbilt responded by taking the lead for good on a 3-pointer by Tyler Nickel with 1:50 left.
From there, Kentucky’s late-game turnover follies doomed the Cats.
Oweh has now scored in double figures in all 19 Wildcats games this season.
5. First two-game losing streaks for UK coaches. Coming off last Saturday’s 102-97 loss to Alabama at Rupp Arena, Kentucky has now lost two straight games for the first time in the Mark Pope coaching era.
Below is how many games were elapsed for each UK head man starting with Adolph Rupp when they reached their first two-game skid:
▪ Adolph Rupp: 11th and 12th games.
▪ Joe B. Hall: Second and third games.
▪ Eddie Sutton: 46th and 47th games.
▪ Rick Pitino: Eighth and ninth games.
▪ Tubby Smith: 51st and 52nd games.
▪ Billy Gillispie: Fifth and sixth games.
▪ John Calipari: 59th and 60th games.
▪ Mark Pope: 18th and 19th games.
This story was originally published January 25, 2025 at 5:01 PM.
