Three takeaways from Kentucky basketball’s win at Vanderbilt
Three takeaways from Kentucky basketball’s 78-66 win over the Vanderbilt Commodores on Tuesday night in Nashville:
1. Run, Oscar, run!
UK Coach John Calipari has a sprint coordinator this season, an assistant coach (Brad Calipari) who keeps track of the number of times an individual player sprints up and down the floor. A few games back, his center, Oscar Tshiebwe, was not sprinting like he should.
“So now I am focused on him running the court,” the UK coach said Tuesday night.
It’s working. Up and down the Memorial Gym floor did Tshiebwe go. And once he got to the offensive end, his teammates found him. And Oscar delivered. Talk about Memorial Magic. Tshiebwe ended up with a career-high 30 points and grabbed 13 rebounds, the first UK player to go 30/10 since Patrick Patterson had 33 points and 11 rebounds against Tennessee State on Dec. 22, 2008.
A ravenous rebounder, did Tshiebwe ever think he’d score 30 points in a game? No, he admitted in his postgame Zoom session. “I never had a dream about scoring 30 points in a game,” he said. “My team is helping me. They’re looking for me down there. I have ability down the post.”
He is improving on his abilities in the post. Oscar just keeps getting better and better.
2. No Wheeler, no problem, part two
Not having point guard Sahvir Wheeler (neck injury) at home last Saturday against Georgia didn’t hurt the Cats in their 92-77 victory over the Bulldogs. Not having the point guard on the road Tuesday night didn’t hurt the Cats in their 12-point victory over the Commodores.
The reason? This is a very unselfish team. The Cats didn’t get the record-setting 17-assist show TyTy Washington put on against the Bulldogs, but it wasn’t needed. The victors were credited with 15 assists on the way to shooting 52.5 percent from the floor. Washington led the way with four assists, followed by Jacob Toppin with three. Davion Mintz, Keion Brooks and Kellan Grady each had two assists.
It was a good night for Brooks, who scored nine points and grabbed five rebounds in 23 minutes. The junior even buried a deep bomb from the left wing. He played with the type of energy that Calipari wants.
3. Don’t obsess over those final six minutes
Yes, the Cats didn’t score the final 6:14 of the game. Up 78-50, they watched Vanderbilt score the game’s final 16 points. “We let go of the rope,” Calipari said. “I subbed, then put the starters back in and then the starters didn’t do much better.”
My guess, the Cats got bored. The game was in hand. The crowd in Memorial Gym was filled with loud Kentucky fans — “That was pretty dope,” Brooks said. Cruising along, Calipari’s club lost its concentration. That’s not good, of course. But it’s not a long-term problem.
As for real problems, Tennessee visits Rupp Arena on Saturday. The Vols have been up and down. After losing at LSU last Saturday, Rick Barnes’ team got back to defending back home Tuesday night, whipping visiting South Carolina 66-46.
“We’ve got some hard games coming up,” Calipari said. “Hard games.”
Heading into Tuesday night’s play, Ken Pomeroy’s numbers had Tennessee as the second-best defensive team in the nation, behind only LSU. If you remember, Kentucky lost 65-60 at LSU just last week.
This story was originally published January 11, 2022 at 10:04 PM.
