The Wildcats had their chances, but all in all, it’s hard to call Kentucky‘s first true road test of the season anything but an all-around disappointment. Mark Pope earned his first loss with the team shooting an abysmal 38.1 percent shooting overall, 25.9 percent from three and 61.1 percent at the line. Clemson opened as a home underdog and made the road favorite pay in the form of a good old fashioned court storming.
What went wrong inside Littlejohn Coliseum — besides opposing fans finding the Cats in a stampede at the final buzzer? KSR has the takeaways.
Unable to overcome a disaster first half
Kentucky set the tone initially with a quick 7-2 run, but Clemson responded and really took control the rest of the first half. The Tigers didn’t shoot well, but they absolutely dominated on the glass with a 31-21 lead overall and 13 offensive rebounds leading to 10 second-chance points.
Even when things went well for the Cats in the first half, they immediately went wrong. Down 23-19, they went on a quick 9-0 run to go up 28:23 with 5:45 to go. That led to a 10-0 response and a 14-2 finish at the halftime buzzer, the Tigers going into the locker room with all of the momentum.
It wasn’t gone forever — Kentucky retook the lead with 15:28 to go and had it as late as the 10:57 mark — but it never felt like Pope’s squad was in position to run away with it. Clemson carried itself like a team that was, despite the largest lead of the night being just eight. There was a ton to love about the team’s resolve on the glass, ultimately tying the overall margin and offensively, but the rough start gave the home team and crowd unnecessary and avoidable life.
Kentucky can’t match physicality
The Wildcats said the physicality of their previous matchups vs. WKU and Georgia State would help prepare them for the fight Clemson was going to show inside Littlejohn Coliseum. They knew the Tigers had size and length, a tough, hard-nosed group with plenty of experience that wouldn’t shy away from the challenge. That’s what made the performance so deflating, watching Brad Brownell’s group stick to the script as a top-15 defense nationally, suffocating Kentucky all night and forcing it out of its actions to limit clean looks leading to sloppy turnovers and bad shots. On the other end, Clemson brought it to the UK defense, creating and exploiting mismatches and drawing timely fouls.
“It was a really physical game,” Pope said. “It’s a credit to them, that’s how they play. Their bigs are relentless with their physicality.”
Sped up to get slowed down
Bringing in the No. 300 tempo in college basketball, Clemson confidently controlled the pace against the nation’s sixth-fastest team. The Tigers mucked things up to make a really comfortable offensive team, one that scores more points than anybody on a nightly basis, really uncomfortable and get away from its identity. The off-ball movement and crisp passing we’ve come to love disappeared in the form of 11 assists overall on 24 made field goals compared to 12 turnovers — just three dimes on ten makes in the first half.
In Pope’s eyes, the Wildcats got sped up thanks to the defensive intensity and physicality, leading to his group slowing down. Their trust in each other and the system in place transitioned into hero ball, which goes against everything the team stands for as an offense.
“Sometimes when you get sped up, you actually get slowed down and that very much hampered us on the offensive side,” Pope said. “That comes with just growing trust in the way we play and how we execute. I think we’ll be really disappointed with ourselves and how we tried to ring the bell on the offensive side. We try to, out of the goodness of our hearts and the care for our team, try to fix a lot of things by ourselves. It’s not how we play.”
7-27 from three
Kentucky made on average 11.1 3-pointers per game going into the Clemson game, good for No. 1 in the SEC and No. 12 in Division I. That led to an average of 96.7 points per contest through seven outings, good for No. 1 both within the SEC and nationally. Those two things have gone hand in hand.
What went hand in hand for the Wildcats in Clemson? A season-low 66 points for the Wildcats following an abysmal 7-27 mark from three. Jaxson Robinson and Butler were the only players to make multiple shots from the perimeter while the rest of the team combined for just three makes on 16 tries. They couldn’t buy a bucket with three-minute scoring draught popping up left and right as the Tigers found just enough consistency to pull off the win.
Lamont Butler dealt with foul trouble and a tweaked ankle
The San Diego State transfer was one of very few gems for the Wildcats against the Tigers, finishing with 16 points on 6-9 shooting and 2-4 from three with five assists, two rebounds and a steal. That all came in just 19 minutes, though, Butler limited to just nine in the first due to foul trouble and 12 in the second dealing with a tweaked ankle.
He scored on a quick and-one to give UK a spark, then earned another tough bucket for the team’s biggest lead of the day at six before all hell broke loose down the stretch. The ball movement ramped up in the second half after it stuck early, only to see Butler follow that up with the injury.
Is it a totally different ball game with the fifth-year senior out there longer as a game-high plus-17? Odds are good.
“We just didn’t function great (with Butler out) so I wonder if there’s a way to roll the dice a little bit more and magnify those minutes,” Pope said. “Lamont was kind of giving us everything he had in the second half but he was on a little bit of broken wheel and so certainly that had some impact on the game.”
Andrew Carr and Kerr Kriisa were no-shows
Carr saved the day for Kentucky against Duke in the Champions Classic, going for a team-high 17 points and six rebounds. That was against ACC competition, just as Clemson was for the former ACC member himself as a Wake Forest transfer. His past two performances against the Tigers were for 18 points and 11 rebounds, then 17 points and five rebounds — both wins. It was fair to expect the fifth-year senior to be the one to step up once again in a tough road environment against a familiar foe. Instead, he passed up open shots and missed the ones he took en route to five points on 1-7 shooting with five rebounds two assists, two blocks and two turnovers in 24 minutes.
As for Kriisa, his time on the floor was crucial with Butler out for extended stretches in both halves. Instead, he wrapped up the day with zero points on 0-4 shooting to go with two rebounds and one steal in 21 minutes for a team-low -21 in plus/minus. He looked to draw fouls with flops early, but the officials quickly caught on and failed to bail him out, leading to transition opportunities the other direction with Kriisa still laying on the floor. When it came to actual production, the beloved fifth-year senior came up short.
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