Kentucky Wildcats: Time for Devin Booker to shake that slump

1 of 2

More from Kentucky Wildcats News

As the Kentucky Wildcats prepare for the West Virginia Mountaineers, one game stand out for Wildcat fans: the 2010 Elite Eight loss. Forget for a moment that Kentucky actually beat West Virginia in 2011 and got their revenge, the nerves of the BBN are still a bit raw because of the WVU loss. And helping fuel that paranoia is the fact that Devin Booker has been mired in a shooting slump. For one, I am not that worried about Booker. As we have seen through the course of the season, he can be a streaky shooter. And it is about time for him to turn the corner on his recent skid.

"So yeah, even with “Mr. Big Shot” Aaron Harrison on this team and his twin Andrew warming up recently, Calipari would prefer UK’s sharpest outside shooter shake off this slump he’s in. In the last 15 games, Booker has hit just 15 of 56 (26.8 percent) from 3-point range. That after a blistering stretch of 11 games when he looked like the best shooter in America, hitting 25 of 38 (65.8 percent) from deep. Freshman center Karl-Anthony Towns had some advice for Booker last week. “Oh, yeah, I definitely told him something on the court. It was, uh, ‘Keep shooting,’ ” Towns said, grinning. “He’ll be fine. I’m not worried about that with him. He’s a pure shooter. I’m going to tell him to keep shooting. I hope next game he’ll come out and shoot 20 shots.” That’s the good news for Kentucky: missing doesn’t rattle Booker. He keeps firing. Perhaps in part because he’s been through this before – a lot. He’s a streaky shooter. His first three games in a UK jersey, during the team’s exhibition trip to the Bahamas this summer, Booker made just 4 of 17 shots and 2 of 6 threes. In the last three games of that trip, though, he sank 7 of 15 overall and 4 of 8 from beyond the arc."

Mandatory Credit: Jamie Rhodes-USA TODAY Sports

Ready for one more take on the John Calipari coach of the year snub? I admit that personally, I have strayed away from the subject because really I don’t care too much about personal honors. John Calipari does not either. As a matter of fact, Calipari NOT getting the coach of the year award is perhaps the only way he can advance his “us against the world” theory that he preaches. Even at 36-0 John Calipari and to a lesser effect, his team are disrespected. I’m sure that Calipari has brought this up to his team more than once. Dan Wetzel points out that Bobby Knight did not get the COY award when Indiana went undefeated and won the title.

"Consider the last college basketball team to put together a perfect season, the 1975-76 Indiana Hoosiers, who finished 32-0. Their coach, Bob Knight, didn’t win the USBWA award in that year; Michigan’s Johnny Orr did. How? Good question. Michigan went 25-7, didn’t crack the top 10 until the final poll and lost three times to the Hoosiers. Was a fourth necessary? The main culprit appears to be the timing of the vote … after the regular season but before the NCAAs. At that point no one knew Indiana would actually finish with a perfect record – let alone that it wouldn’t be done again for 39 years and counting. Plus, the USBWA had just given the honor to Knight the season prior, when his team put together a 29-0 regular season only to lose to Kentucky in the NCAA regional final and finish 31-1. So it may have been a case of been there, done that. Of course, Knight did win the award for his first perfect regular season. As did Wichita State’s Gregg Marshall last year and St. Joseph’s Phil Martelli for the Hawks’ unbeaten 2003-04 season. Calipari did not. This leads to the strange belief that the coach who did the best job is the one who exceeded preseason expectations."

Mandatory Credit: Brian Spurlock-USA TODAY Sports

No matter what happens or who the Kentucky Wildcats may beat to win the 2015 National Title, there are still going to be people who complain the Kentucky played no one all year. Mark Titus has a solution.

"Assuming Kentucky doesn’t completely crap the bed, there are only a handful of teams in the country that could take down the Cats. And Kentucky has to play only two of them, at most. Villanova and Virginia are out, Arizona and Wisconsin will have to play each other before the Final Four, and the same goes for Duke and Gonzaga. This is why I say we take the selection committee’s 1-68 list and Street Fighter this sumbitch. Kentucky starts at team 68 and moves up the list with each win until it reaches the top. And what happens when it runs the table and ends up 101-0?6 It goes up against the final boss, which is — you guessed it — the Philadelphia 76ers."

Home/Kentucky Wildcats News