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Alex Poythress earned an "A+"
Kentucky was back home in Rupp today and was able to squeak out a 75-70 win against LSU coming off of the loss to Alabama. This win improved UK to 4-2 in the SEC and was a win UK had to have. The Cats had an up and down performance, as has become their custom, but they were able to get the win. With that, lets get to the grades:
*Offense
Earlier I talked about how Wiltjer needed to get 10 shots and he only was able to manage 8. He really wasn’t able to get in the offense but that had a lot to do with how tight LSU was playing him. The Cats were able to beat the goal of 70 points and 45% shooting I listed as keys to the game. UK scored 75 points and shot a terrific 52% from the field. The only bad area was UK committing 16 turnovers, but LSU forces as many turnovers as anyone in the conference. Good performance by the offense.
Grade: A-
*Halftime slump
This is starting to become a habit, but not of the good kind. UK was outscored again coming out of halftime by three going into the first tv timeout. UK had an eleven point lead going into halftime but again came out uninspired after halftime and let the lead dwindle. That lead eventually was narrowed all the way to one. This team has to find a way to be more productive coming out of the half. This is the difference between putting teams away and losing games you shouldn’t lose. There is no reason LSU should have been able to cut into the lead after the half.
Grade: F
*Poythress on the court
Alex Poythress is BACK. Well, that may be a stretch but he played one of his best games as a Cat today and recorded his first career double double with 20 points and 12 rebounds. Poythress played inspired basketball and was able to avoid foul trouble. He showed the beast that he can be while on the court and really impressed me with his aggressiveness down low and on the glass. I can’t say enough how impressed I was with his aggressive play today and if he can play like that the rest of the season, this is a completely different team. This is the first time all year and probably the last, but I think he deserves the highest grade possible.
Grade: A+
*Noel
Nerlens Noel was 4-5 in the first half making 4 very impressive jump hooks. I was going to say Calipari must have been reading my things to watch for because they went to him early and often and he was tremendous with the jump hooks in the first half. Then the second half came around and he took, get this, zero shots from the field. It was incredible to watch the guy who dominated in the first half not get looks in the second half. Some of it was LSU and them double teaming him, but a lot of it was him not looking for the shots like he did early in the game. He still played a good game and continued to terrorize opponents on defense with 6 blocks. When he is hitting jump hooks they have to continue to go to him. As soon as they stopped getting him shots the driving lanes clogged up and the offense bogged down again in the second half. Still, it was great to see him showing his ability to hit shots on the low block.
Grade: B+
That’s all for tonight. Good win and hopefully Cauley-Stein will be back next game Go big blue.
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