In case you missed it, the Vanderbilt Commodores knocked off the Tennessee Volunteers 85-76 earlier Wednesday night to yes, make Saturday’s game at Rupp Arena a TRUE MUST WIN GAME … for the Wildcats. As scary as it sounds, the Wildcats risk falling from number one in the country to two games behind the Commodores in the SEC East with road trips to Vandy, Tennessee, and Mississippi State still on the schedule.
*Gulp*
Not trying to play “chicken little” and say the sky is falling, but the Wildcats have their toughest stretch of basketball in front of them … and Kentucky needs to start focusing on basketball once again and make basketball headlines the only headlines they make for the rest of the season.
In the last couple of weeks, UK had been making more than it’s share of off court headlines and it’s my opinion that this was just bringing the pressure on this team to an incredible boiling point … and it all came to a head on Tuesday night.
The combination of Kentucky returning to number one in the country, UK being the last undefeated team in the country, the Hoops for Haiti telethon, and the attention that Wall, Bledsoe, and Cousins are getting created a perfect storm of media attention that most pro teams do not get. This all culminated in the made for the media phone call with Barack Obama to the Wildcat basketball team just hours before UK played South Carolina. Is there any wonder that some players heads may not have been on just basketball Tuesday Night? John Calipari has admitted that his mind drifted to the “Hoops for Haiti” telethon during the UK/Auburn game.
Don’t get me wrong. I love the fact that we have a coach that has so much empathy for other people that he is willing to add to his already busy schedule and spend several hours on his Sunday off to help to raise money for others. You will find no bigger fan of John Calipari than myself. I love the fact that he is the ambassador for the Commonwealth of Kentucky … but am I the only one thinking that he may be stretching himself too thin? Calipari was doing media interviews about the telethon like he was pimping a movie on Letterman and Conan. Once again, I love the passion of the man, but there is no doubt this took a lot of his spare time.
More than one person has noted that Devan Downey and the Gamecocks took offense when Barack Obama mentioned that UK should handle the Gamecocks and Downey was obviously on a mission to show up these UK diaper dandies that had been getting all the media attention and the Sports Illustrated covers.
Granted, Kentucky is Kentucky and we are every other teams “Super Bowl”. But all the winning streak did was to make that target that much bigger and lead to other stupid media distractions like the “Jagoff comment” or the ridiculous claim made by a South Carolina student that DeMarcus Cousins hit him. This kind of stuff enters the minds of the coaching staff as well and can affect the preparations for the game.
But now, the streak is over. The telethon is history. The talk of perfection is gone. The stay at number one falls by the wayside as well. And the target on UK’s back …. it’s still there. But now UK can focus on what it does best and that is play basketball. Vanderbilt is the one to walk into an opposing arena on Saturday with their position at the top to lose. And you better bet UK will be well prepared to take it.
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