There was an uneasiness entering this one, knowing what was on the line in a rare must-win on December 2 with two ugly power conference losses to open the year in two tries, followed by a month of essentially nothing but difficult competition before conference play begins in January. The SEC is down this year compared to its historic dominance a year ago, so the wins could pile up then, but it won’t help much on Selection Sunday. We were facing a reality that if Kentucky was going to fall on its face against Louisville and Michigan State to open the year, it needed to make up for it by getting through the North Carolina, Gonzaga, Indiana and St. John’s run either totally or mostly clean to rejoin the national conversation as a serious competitor in 2025-26.

Then the Wildcats went 10:25 in the second half without scoring a single field goal against the Tar Heels to fall to 0-3 against teams with a pulse. That 67-64 loss also included a 1-13 finish from three while being outrebounded 41-30 overall and giving up 20 offensive rebounds to create a 22-5 advantage on second-chance points. They also turned it over nine times compared to just eight assists on 23 made baskets.

Otega Oweh was back to his usual self and played up to his standard of excellence for the very first time this season — part of why it was fair to call his play in those other two losses unacceptable, because we know he’s capable. He finished with a team-high 16 points on 6-11 shooting with four rebounds, two assists, two blocks and two steals. He was not the problem.

There was also a ton to like with Andrija Jelavic, who finished with six points (3-6 FG), four rebounds and a block, but more impressively held superstar freshman Caleb Wilson to 15 points on an abysmal 5-19 shooting and 0-2 from three — by far his worst game of the season. Collin Chandler (12 points, two rebounds, two steals) and Malachi Moreno (eight points, nine rebounds, three blocks, two steals) had their moments, too. In general, you felt at halftime you were just watching a competitive back-and-forth between two tough and physical blue bloods with shots just not falling for Kentucky and North Carolina simply dominating on the glass, two things that could swing the other way in the second half while also acknowledging Wilson could take over at any moment. It had the potential for an electric feel-good finish.

Then it developed into a battle of two deeply flawed basketball teams — the Wildcats led by four to begin the 10:25 field goal drought at the 13:08 mark, but still led by one to end it with 2:43 to go, if that tells you anything about the Tar Heels — with the winner just slightly less mediocre at this stage of the season. As for the loser? Well, if Will Stein is all about feeding the studs on the football field, Mark Pope is getting pretty good at feeding us duds on the basketball floor.

Through eight games, we have learned absolutely nothing about this team’s identity because it has no identity. For now, it looks like a group of pieces that do not fit together because Pope obsessed over toughness and physicality so much this offseason that he overlooked the importance of adding the shooters that make his system tick and expected the team’s strength in depth to make up for its limited top-end talent. Those things may improve with Jaland Lowe, Mo Dioubate and Jayden Quaintance on the floor, but if we’re already complaining about the substitution patterns and cutting fat in the rotation now as the head coach is finding ways to “kind of dig deeper into this rotation to get some quality minutes” due to fatigue, I’m gonna have to see it to believe it.

Right now, Kentucky does not look like a team capable of beating serious competition, and judging by the Wildcats’ reactions after the fact, they seem to think the same thing. It was not the same devastated bunch that took the podium in the Madison Square Garden media room after getting smacked by Michigan State, struggling to put into words how they’ve failed to meet their standard of excellence against ranked competition. There was no surprise with this outcome, even as a firm favorite playing at home with the most passionate fanbase in America trying to push you across the finish line. It’s like they understand the expectations have been reset for the year and this is now a year-long project with likely lumps along the way, hoping the early adversity pays off down the road — playing for March, as one old friend would call it.

That’s disappointing if not embarrassing knowing the hype and cost, but what can you do?

For now, this team’s focus should not be on hanging banner No. 9, but rather avoiding a total collapse in December that could put the Wildcats on the outside looking in of NCAA Tournament contention. And that’s not hyperbole, as dumb as it sounds. They have no resume a quarter of the way through the season and are projected to lose two of three (Gonzaga and St. John’s) name-brand games the rest of the month, according to Bart Torvik. The SEC is a shell of itself, meaning the wins aren’t going to help as much (nine Quad 1 opportunities compared to 14 last year) and the losses are going to hurt much worse (six Quad 2, two Quad 3 and one Quad 4 opportunities compared to two Quad 2 and two Quad 3 last year), so you have no choice but to make your move now if you want to avoid fighting for your postseason life in league play.

Let it snowball a bit and we could be having very uncomfortable conversations by the end of the season.

“That’s your job as a pro, right?  You can’t allow that,” Pope said of that exact scenario. “… I feel like we found a little bit of ourselves in this game. There is no safety net right now. We just have to get better.”

It’s not time to wave the white flag on Pope’s sophomore campaign — again, we are just eight games and three losses into this — but it is fair to say the sirens are going off with no immediate answer. You thought this was the bounce-back game, but it was just more of the same. Why should we expect things to magically fall in place against Gonzaga down in Nashville just two days from now? That’s hope, not genuine belief.

It’s a long season, but it could feel endless if this team doesn’t get its stuff figured out in a hurry.