Kentucky

KSR's ten favorite things from Kentucky's win over Georgia State

Published

1 year ago

November 30, 2024

KSR's ten favorite things from Kentucky's win over Georgia State

It was a weird night inside Rupp Arena, one that included a sloppy start and a rowdy finish leading to a blowout victory for the Kentucky Wildcats over the Georgia State Panthers. There was a fight, free ice cream and everything in between.

How did Mark Pope coach his team to another win en route to a 7-0 start on the year, the team’s best since 2016-17 and one victory away from the best start since 2014-15? How about some of the other highlights? KSR’s got the ten best things from the win.

1. Clash Peters gets bullied into oblivion

You hate to punch down on a zero-star kid playing for Georgia State, but when you’re a dirty basketball player whose uncle also happens to be a Duke villain with a similarly stupid name, it happens. Cherokee Parks’ nephew, Clash Peters, became enemy No. 1 of Big Blue Nation on Friday for undercutting Amari Williams on a pass inside leading to a brouhaha resulting in technicals also called on Koby Brea, Otega Oweh and Zarique Nutter of the Panthers. Mark Pope even got out there to split players up and cool down the emotions before things got any further out of hand.

Trash Peters has been ejected. https://t.co/8BHP1iShms pic.twitter.com/rtYquPPi6Y
— Rare Rookies #BBN (@rarerookies) November 30, 2024
Advertisement

If the public shame wasn’t enough inside Rupp Arena, fans then proceeded to dig up old photos of young Clash rocking Duke gear with a terrible haircut next to Zion Williamson.

Oh, and Clash in a Duke sweater and jorts doing his best to look mysterious as he gazes away from the camera.

None of us knew Clash Peters existed before tonight. Now he’s hated for eternity by the most passionate fanbase in college basketball. Funny how life works.

2. Plus-21 after the fight

It was an eight-point lead with 12:37 to go when all hell broke loose, Peters leading the four-technical sequence that included a ten-minute stoppage of play. That point forward, the Wildcats went on a 44-23 run to close out the game, turning a 61-53 lead into a 105-76 win.

There wasn’t a ton to love about Kentucky’s start, Georgia State down just two points with five minutes to go in the first half. The Cats responded with a 17-1 run to lead by as many as 18 before going into the break up 48-33, only to let that lead slip away down to just six, then eight right before the scuffle and statement finish.

If we can somehow bottle that energy from the 5:06 mark to the 1:08 mark in the first half, then everything after the fight, we’d be in good shape.

3. Mark Pope gives away free ice cream

Waiting for Coach Pope’s first misstep in Lexington? It didn’t come against Georgia State.

The Cats ran away with it, plus the Kentucky head coach jumped in the thick of things when it got chippy — he joked he’s just happy he didn’t pull a hamstring jogging out there. His best moment, though, came during postgame radio when he told the crowd that while he couldn’t stay after to sign autographs, the Popes did leave the family credit card at the ice cream stand so fans could get a cone or two on their way out of Rupp Arena.

“The word on the street is, here in Rupp Arena, we have the best ice cream in the world,” Pope said. “So, Mrs. Lee Anne dropped her credit card off at the ice cream stand right up here, so it’s on me tonight. Go help yourselves. Get some ice cream on the way out. Enjoy it, and thank you guys for coming here. Let’s go Cats.”

No one else in the country is doing that.

4. Seven players in double figures

I don’t have the stats in front of me, but I doubt anyone else in the country has seven players finishing in double digits in a single game, either. Kentucky entered the matchup with five different Wildcats averaging between 10.8 and 16.5 points, plus another right behind with 9.3. Tonight, we saw seven players score between 10 and 19 points, everyone with at least 20 minutes hitting the double-figure mark.

Jaxson Robinson led the way with 19, followed by Lamont Butler with 17, Amari Williams with 14, Otega Oweh and Ansley Almonor with 12 and Andrew Carr and Koby Brea with 10. Kerr Kriisa is the only guy who played at least six minutes (16) and did not hit that barrier, yet he still managed to go for nine and did his best to add another bucket — more on that in a second.

Doesn’t get more well-rounded than that.

5. Rupp Arena was on a different planet

It feels like we talk about the crowd after every game, but my goodness, Rupp Arena was unbelievable against Georgia State. Sun Belt competition in 30-degree weather on Black Friday? No problem — the venue was packed from top to bottom.

Fans made their presence known, too, flipping the momentum when the Panthers fought to make a push and especially when the fight broke out in the second half. They were loud from the opening tip, but the pop on Kentucky’s big plays — Kerr Kriisa’s charges, Otega Oweh’s reverse dunk and basically whenever Clash Peters even thought about touching the ball — were special.

Then a good portion of those fans stuck around afterward to listen to Pope’s postgame radio show. Little did they know, they’d be leaving with words of wisdom and free ice cream.

6. Kerr Kriisa is Mr. 997

Wondering why No. 77 launched a trio of 3-pointers in the final 1:19 with the game well out of reach? It’s because Kriisa was just one shot away from his 1000th career point in college.

The fifth-year senior entered the game with 988 total points following stops at Arizona, West Virginia and now Kentucky. Going for nine in the first 38 minutes to bring him to 997, Kriisa reentered the game with 1:44 to go in hopes of getting three more to hit the 1,000-point mark. He missed all three, but you miss 100 percent of the shots you don’t take, right? Odds are good he would’ve taken a couple more if there was additional time on the clock.

“It was actually super fun. All our guys were cheering like crazy for him. Demanding that he shoot it,” Pope said after the game. “And the one thing about Kerr: if you tell him to shoot the ball, he’s gonna shoot it.”

7. Patrick Sparks pump-faked as the Y

Kentucky has had an all-time run of special guest appearances this season with names including Dale Brown, Jim Andrews, Travis Ford and Dicky Lyons Jr. honored as celebratory Ys. That continued in a major way against Georgia State with none other than Patrick Sparks earning a roar from BBN at mid-court.

The best part? He pump-faked at the UK logo, just as he did in the corner against Louisville inside Freedom Hall back in 2004 to pull off the road win. In the spirit of rivalry week, he recreated his signature moment with fans enjoying every second.

Welcome back, No. 22.

8. 33-41 on 2-pointers

Kentucky finished just 7-26 from three, the team’s worst shooting night of the year and the second game in a row failing to hit the double-figure mark after doing it in each of the first five.

Instead, the Wildcats found a way to win inside the arc, going an impressive 33-41 on 2-pointers for an insane 80.5 percent finish. That’s how you manage to shoot 59.7 percent from the field overall despite a 26.9 percent mark from deep.

9. A 38-point difference in the paint

When you shoot 80 percent on twos, odds are good a solid chunk of those buckets are going to come inside the paint. That was the case for Kentucky, who racked up an impressive 62 points in that area.

Even better? Georgia State only scored 24 points in the paint, a surprise considering the team entered the game shooting just 33.8 percent from deep with its best player and leading scorer, Zarique Nutter, being a non-shooter. The Panthers have size, especially up top, but it didn’t really show as the Wildcats simply dominated inside while also winning the rebounding battle by nine.

10. Ansley Almonor is emerging as a fan-favorite

Doesn’t it feel like good things happen every time the Fairleigh Dickinson transfer enters the game? He had his best performance as a Wildcat, finishing with 12 points on 4-5 shooting and 2-3 from three to go with four rebounds and two steals in 24 minutes.

Kentucky was a bit short-handed in the frontcourt with Brandon Garrison held out “more as a precaution than anything else” with “a little bit of soreness,” but Almonor once again stepped up in a major way, just as he always does — this time in an expanded role. He came in knowing he wouldn’t be playing the most minutes or taking the most shots, but his impact on the game is just as important as anyone at this point.

Source link

Kentucky

Midwest Equipment Manufacturing invests $15M in Northern Kentucky, creating 66 jobs

Published

9 hours ago

December 22, 2025

Press Room

Midwest Equipment Manufacturing invests M in Northern Kentucky, creating 66 jobs

FRANKFORT, Ky. (WKRC) – Governor Andy Beshear announced a major expansion of Kentucky’s manufacturing sector as Midwest Equipment Manufacturing Inc. plans to invest $15 million to expand operations in Maysville, creating 66 skilled jobs.

“Kentucky’s thriving manufacturing sector has been an important component in our state’s recent economic momentum,” Beshear said. “We continue to see leaders in the manufacturing sector invest in the commonwealth and our communities, providing good-paying, quality job opportunities for Kentuckians, and this includes 66 new jobs being created by Midwest Equipment Manufacturing. I want to thank the company’s leaders for relocating and investing in Mason County, and I look forward to seeing their success in our New Kentucky Home.”

The project will transform the company’s Maysville facility into a new manufacturing hub, helping address labor shortages and production backlogs. Several key product lines, including the Tru-Cut Mower and the 500 Series Brown Bear Composter, will be relocated from Thorntown, Indiana, to Maysville.

Dan Kallevig, president of Tru-Cut Mowers, said the company is enthusiastic about the move. “I have been to Maysville a few times in the past few months, and I am very impressed with the kindness of the people I have met.”

“As part of the ongoing renaissance of residential and commercial activity in the city’s east end neighborhood, the city of Maysville is pleased to express its full support for the relocation of Midwest Equipment Manufacturing to Maysville. We remain committed to sustaining the positive momentum within our community and are excited to not only retain 16 valuable manufacturing jobs in our city but also welcome the creation of an additional 66 positions through Midwest Equipment Manufacturing’s expansion,” said Maysville Mayor Debra L. Cotterill.

Source link

Kentucky

‘My hero.’ George Clooney’s sister dies at 65 in Northern Kentucky

Published

21 hours ago

December 21, 2025

Press Room

‘My hero.’ George Clooney’s sister dies at 65 in Northern Kentucky

George Clooney’s sister, Adelia “Ada” Zeidler, died on Friday in Northern Kentucky.

Zeidler died at St. Elizabeth Hospital on Dec. 19, according to her obituary. Clooney confirmed to People magazine his sister died after a battle with cancer. She was 65.

“My sister, Ada, was my hero,” Clooney told the magazine. “She faced down cancer with courage and humor. I’ve never met anyone so brave. Amal and I will miss her terribly.”

Zeidler was born in May 1960 to her parents, Nick and Nina Clooney in Los Angeles, her obituary says. She was an artist and worked as an elementary art teacher at Augusta Independent School for several years. She was a member of the Augusta Art Guild and was a past grand marshal of Augusta’s Annual White Christmas Parade.

Augusta, Kentucky, is a small town about an hour east of Cincinnati along the Ohio River. It was the childhood home of Clooney while his father, Nick Clooney, was a reporter for WKRC Local 12.

In a 2015 interview with “CBS This Morning,” Clooney noted he is really close with his family. “My sister, I’m very close to,” he said.

Zeidler was not a public figure like Clooney. But in 2012, she gave an interview to the New York Daily News, where she shared that she had dreams of becoming an actor herself.

“Yes, there is a part of me that would very much like to have become a famous actress or something like that,” she said at the time. “I enjoy acting and I was fairly OK at it, but I did not have a thick enough skin for it.”

She added that she instead prioritized raising her children, saying, “I really enjoyed being a wife and a mother and that kind of wound up taking precedence with me.”

Zeidler was preceded in death by her husband Norman Zeidler, who died in 2004.

She leaves behind her two children, Nick Zeidler and Allison Zeidler Herolaga and her husband, Kenny; her brother, Clooney and his wife, Amal; and several uncles, aunts, and cousins.

A funeral Mass will be offered at noon on Monday, Dec. 22, at St. Patrick Catholic Church in Maysville, Kentucky. Private interment will be in the St. Patrick Cemetery in Washington, Kentucky.

USA TODAY reporter Brendan Morrow contributed.

Source link

Kentucky

Kentucky salvaged the season — and proved mercenaries still kill

Published

1 day ago

December 21, 2025

Press Room

Kentucky salvaged the season — and proved mercenaries still kill

“I’m stupid, you’re smart. I was wrong, you were right. You’re the best, I’m the worst. You’re very good-looking, I’m not attractive.”

It’s a Happy Gilmore quote, but the crow-eating tastes the same for me as I gather my thoughts with an emotional day winding down at State Farm Arena. Kentucky hit rock bottom in Nashville with a 35-point loss to Gonzaga to make it four losses in four tries against name-brand competition, these Wildcats getting worse before they were getting better — but most damning of all, they didn’t look like they cared. That’s why Big Blue Nation booed them off the floor and I called them overpaid, heartless portal mercenaries who were taking the “sacred piece of cloth,” as Mark Pope likes to call these uniforms, and wiping their asses with it.

My words and my words alone.

Those were very real heat-of-the-moment reactions that felt deserved. They were also the heat-of-the-moment reactions that led to a stern talking to from Rick freaking Pitino, saying Kentucky media members were too quick to judge Pope’s Wildcats without having the full picture with injuries destroying this group to start the season.

“I think you all need to learn a little bit of a lesson as writers because you’re expecting Kentucky to be this great basketball team with all those injuries,” Pitino said. “So you all need to learn a lesson because you can’t be a great basketball team without two of your best players, with no point guard, no big men. So I think everybody really exaggerates one game or two games or three games.

“Kentucky got blown out, and usually Kentucky doesn’t get blown out of any game, okay. But you have to look at it when they come back, two gigantic pieces.”

There is a lot of truth to that and I want to start there. It was unfair to put this team in its coffin without first seeing how all of the pieces would work together — not just most of them. You don’t walk out to the floor blaring Many Men by 50 Cent if you haven’t heard the noise that you’ve been written off as a group. Jaland Lowe and Jayden Quaintance were complete game-changers and availability has been quite literally the only question mark for both players since the season tipped off. They play — and play well — and Kentucky wins. Is it that simple? They haven’t been allowed to prove otherwise, so until then, we can only judge what’s in front of us. For that, I was completely wrong and shortsighted with a sample size far too small and incomplete. I have no problem owning up to my stupidity.

Hear me out on this, though. I had roster construction concerns and still don’t feel totally comfortable about how all of these puzzle pieces fit together — again, where is the creation and shooting?! — for Pope to believe “we’re going to become a really explosive offensive team,” but those things can all play out. They’ve clawed back enough to earn that patience.

The root of our frustrations had to do with the fight and want-to, though. That’s why these Wildcats got booed. That’s why they were generally unlikable through nine games and four losses. Nothing about their play suggested they wanted this the way Big Blue Nation wanted this or that representing the name on the front of their uniforms actually mattered. Take the first halves vs. Indiana and St. John’s, for example. The offensive execution stunk in both games and they couldn’t buy a basket if their lives depended on it, but not once did I question effort or heart. Trying and failing is fine for fans, to an extent, but what they don’t tolerate is not trying at all. Pitino can say what he wants and that may be how those inside the Kentucky program feel right now — we certainly haven’t made any friends over there recently, which is fine — but there has been a stark difference in the first nine games vs. the last three. That’s where they have deservedly been crushed, not general production.

Maybe it was the realization that Lowe was nearly back to himself and Quaintance was on the cusp of his debut, or that Mo Dioubate was the spark going 1-on-5 for rebounds and taking entire teams on by himself? Or maybe they finally took their criticism to heart and recognized just how much they were letting the fanbase down as the most underperforming team in college basketball with a couple of inexcusably gutless performances?

Whatever it was, rooting hard for this group is now coming naturally. They were gutless, then showed nothing but guts in that second half against the Hoosiers a week ago, winning in the trenches with defense and toughness. Fans reacted accordingly, acknowledging that while this IU team may not be a world-beater, giving a damn goes a long way. You can steal our hearts with a few dives for loose balls, defensive stops and second-chance scores. That continued into an emotionally charged battle between student and teacher, Pope taking on his former head coach under the bright lights in Catlanta. The offense was a disaster — especially when Lowe reinjured his shoulder after seven seconds on the floor — but hey, they fought and the C-A-T-S chants and Go Big Blues kept coming.

Then when the breakthrough came in the second half of both games, BBN was there to push these Wildcats across the finish line. Lowe fought through the pain like a warrior and put the team on his back while Quaintance had the debut of a lifetime, plus big days for Otega Oweh, Kam Williams and Malachi Moreno, leading to the 78-66 victory to move to 8-4 on the year with two straight wins against teams with a pulse.

You still have to take care of business vs. Bellarmine on Tuesday, but what Kentucky did was allow a hard reset going into the holidays and the start of SEC play. This stretch has given this group the benefit of the doubt. Was it the injuries or effort? Doesn’t matter, because at full strength, the fight was right where it needed to be. The on-court talent has improved, but so has the edge they’re playing with. They can now take the next two weeks and tinker with the offense while building upon their tangible defensive growth, knowing that it’s all salvageable with a resume slowly but surely coming together. No bad losses and two Quad 1 wins with 11 more opportunities to come during SEC play, plus whatever happens in Nashville? Last year’s group had 10 Q1 victories entering the SEC Tournament and earned a No. 3 seed. This one found itself in a massive hole, but to their credit, the Wildcats are digging their way out with reasons to believe — even if the identity is substantially different than any of us expected going into the year.

Heartless mercenaries? They’ve certainly shut me up on the first part of that statement these last two outings, showing nothing but heart. As for the second, we should probably remember that no matter the why, mercenaries are still trained professionals hired to kill. They may have been expensive with some egregious early misses on the young season, and it may not be the aesthetically pleasing product we all thought we were signing up for this year, but the trigger is now being pulled with back-to-back hits.

And judging by the jersey pops with Big Blue Nation roaring behind them and bench celebrations for every big play, it certainly looks like they’re starting to enjoy representing the name on the front, too.

Source link