Three takeaways from Kentucky basketball’s loss to the Richmond Spiders
In addition to my column, three takeaways from Kentucky’s 76-64 loss to the Richmond Spiders:
1. This was not an upset
The wise guys in Las Vegas will tell you differently. They set Kentucky as a 7.5-point favorite over the invaders from the Atlantic 10. Kentucky is Kentucky, after all. Length. Talent. Playing at home, where John Calipari’s teams rarely lose. It all made sense.
A deeper dive said it didn’t make sense. Richmond started four seniors from a team that went 24-7 last year and is picked to win the A-10 this year. Jacob Gilyard, the 5-foot-9 point guard, is the returning Defensive Player of the Year in the A-10, who might have the stickiest fingers in all of college basketball. His running mate, 6-foot guard Blake Francis, averaged nearly 18 points a game last season. And Richmond Coach Chris Mooney knows what he’s doing.
Meanwhile, stop me if you’ve heard this before, Kentucky is a young basketball team. Strike that. Kentucky is a ridiculously young basketball team. Calipari started four freshmen along with senior transfer Olivier Sarr against the Spiders’ senior-laden attack.
The difference showed in the meat of the second half. With 11:19 left, Richmond started a 12-2 run for some Sunday separation. Gilyard came up with some key steals while UK sputtered on offense. The Cats committed 21 turnovers for the game and missed all 10 of their three-point shots. That’s a recipe for failure.
“We knew we were going to play really well to win the game, and we didn’t,” UK assistant Joel Justus said.
So if you go by the betting line, Richmond’s win was an upset, but it certainly wasn’t a shock.
2. Calipari will have to figure out his point guard situation
There’s no coach better to do that, of course. Look at Cal’s record from John Wall to Brandon Knight to Tyler Ulis to De’Aaron Fox to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander to Ashton Hagans. Who am I leaving out? Past performance says that by March, Calipari will figure out how his team should play and who will run the show.
Right now, however, he has some teaching to do. Richmond’s guard tandem of Gilyard and Francis had their way with the Kentucky backcourt. The Cats did not register a single assist in the second half and were credited with just five for the game. Little wonder they shot jut 30.6 percent in the second half.
Freshman Devin Askew should be a high school senior right now, but he reclassified to start his college career in 2020-21. Askew finished with two points, two assists and three turnovers in 35 minutes on Sunday. Davion Mintz, the grad transfer from Creighton with 79 career starts to his credit, played 10 minutes off the bench. He missed all four of his shots and finished without an assist or a turnover.
We’ll see how Calipari uses his point guards Tuesday night in Indianapolis against Kansas.
3. Olivier Sarr will play a big role Tuesday night
After failing to score a point or snare a rebound in the first half of the opening-night win over Morehead State last Wednesday, the 7-foot transfer from Wake Forest was much more active against Richmond, scoring 14 points with seven boards in the first 20 minutes.
Sarr tailed off in the second half and ended up with 17 points and 11 rebounds, but he also had five turnovers. He can’t afford a repeat performance Tuesday night in the Champions’ Classic. Not against Kansas, in a matchup that surely is one of the reasons Sarr picked UK in the first place.
While Richmond’s strength is its backcourt, Kansas boasts both size and length. Sarr might be able to take advantage of Jayhawks center David McCormack in the post, but the Frenchman likes to drift to the perimeter, where he has shown a nice touch. Still, Kansas boasts several wing players who will try and contest Sarr’s mid-range shot.
Asked what the biggest lesson the Cats should take from Sunday’s loss, Sarr answered, “We’re the solution.”
This story was originally published November 29, 2020 at 6:04 PM.
