by Paul Jordan
John Calipari can forget UK looking past the Hartford Hawks towards Saturday’s Louisville game. UK played perhaps it’s most impressive overall game in steamrolling the Hawks and in the process, John Wall found himself in the record books with the single game assists record with 16. He bested the previous record of 15, which was held by Travis Ford, who incidentally had a birthday today. Hrmph. Happy Birthday Travis. Step aside. .
In a good omen for Saturday’s game, Kentucky charged like an angry bull when seeing the color red and jumped out to a 21-3 lead just 5:00 into the game. In that opening stanza, the tone was set for the game as UK nailed four 3-pointers in the opening few minutes. This pretty much destroyed the Hawk’s gameplan of playing zone and this is the one special thing about this UK team. They really have no weakness. If you play a zone, Bledsoe, Miller, Dodson, and Wall will rain threes. If you guard the shooters, Patterson and Cousins wreck havoc. The emergence of UK’s 3-point shooting this year is the link that makes this team very dangerous.
And unlike other games against “lesser” opponents, UK did not let the other team back into the game. UK kept up the pressure and John Wall fed Cousins and Patterson for highlight reel dunks and Dodson for 3-pointers and UK maintained their lead and took a 40-20 lead with about 5:00 remaining in the half. This was just a signal for UK to turn up the pressure rather than relax as the last five minutes of the half featured four dunks and two 3-pointers and UK had a 57-31 halftime lead.
For the half, John Wall had 11 assists against zero turnovers. The team, as a whole, had a 19-3 A/TO ratio. DeMarcus Cousins had 15 points and 8 boards. Darnell Dodson was 4-7 from 3-point range, and Daniel Orton had 10 points. The only question about this game was how many Wall would beat Ford’s assist record by.
Kentucky started the second half with a 14-0 blitz and just 5:00 into the half, UK had a 71-31 lead. The rest of the game was a dizzying array of alley oops and dunks and Wall got his 16th assist on a pass to Josh Harrelson and history was made. The reserves played out the rest of the game and UK finished with a 104-61 victory and UK is 14-0 headed into Saturday’s showdown vs the Dirty Cards.
Granted, Hartford is probably the worst team UK will face this season, but UK showed how much they have matured on the season by smothering this team and not letting them get in a thought of creating drama at Rupp. Wall had an eye boggling 16-1 assist/turnover ratio on the night and the team had 30 assists against just seven turnovers. Cousins finished with 19 points and 12 boards in just 19 minutes and no fouls. Darius Miller stepped it up with four treys and 16 points. Darnell Dodson had 6 treys and 19 points. Keep in mind, the Cats did this without Eric Bledsoe who sat out the game to rest an ailing
All in all, you get the feeling watching this UK team that in order for them to lose a game, they will need a total collapse by the entire team, and not just one or two players. It’s a far cry from what we have been used to the last few years and definitely something the BBN can get used to. You just hope that the Wildcats have that same mad bull mentality when they see Cardinal Red on Saturday.
For complete game stats, go here.
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