Rebounding challenge accepted: Kentucky’s attack on the glass vs. Bucknell shows Pope’s impact

There was one statistic that Mark Pope wanted to see improved for his Kentucky Wildcats as the season progressed. This week, he challenged his team to get in better positions and fight for offensive rebounds. They accepted his challenge immediately versus Bucknell.

The game started with two offensive rebounds by the Wildcats on the very first possession: one by Amari Williams and the other by Andrew Carr. The Wildcats ended up going empty in points on that possession, but Mark Pope can smile that his coaching seemed to sink in this week.

They didn't stop there. By the end of the first half, Kentucky had 12 offensive rebounds, only two less than they had all of last game against Wright State. They would eventually end the game with 22 offensive rebounds and well over the 30% offensive rebounding rate that Pope is looking for on the season. This is a fantastic offensive rebounding performance.

The players that led the way were Amari Williams with 5, Ansley Almonor with 4, and Andrew Carr with 3. Yet it was an entire team effort, as eight players were able to record at least one offensive rebound. Pope, after the game, said, "For these guys to respond to a challenge and almost put up 60 rebounds today is incredibly gratifying as a coach."

This shows how quickly and effectively Pope can coach his players. It may not always happen this quickly, but they are willing to learn and ready to implement.

To showcase this point even more, this week, the Kentucky Athletic Department released a video that showed all sorts of highlights from week 1, including some great behind-the-scenes footage and the lead-up to the game action. One clip that really stuck out was when Pope drew up an inbound play, and then the players executed it exactly how he drew it.

The time for getting right and tune-ups is over. The next game is against the Duke Blue Devils in the State Farm Champions Classic on Tuesday, November 12, at 9 p.m. EST on ESPN.