By Jamie H. Vaught
Lipscomb coach Lennie Acuff was very impressed with Kentucky at Rupp Arena Tuesday night when the Wildcats roared to a 97-68 victory.
“That’s the best, offensive, power four team we’ve played in my six years at Lipscomb,” said Acuff, whose club dropped to Coach John Calipari’s Arkansas team 76-60 earlier this month. “I’ll tell you what, if (Lamont) Butler, (Jaxson) Robinson, and (Koby) Brea play like that, they’re going to be a tough, tough, tough out.
“When we play these games, a lot of times it’s the defensive end—they really get after us on defense. I think they are underrated defensively, but I think we had good shots. If the ball does not go in, it’s a hard game. But you make one mistake, or you are one half second late, it’s three (points for Kentucky). And I know they went 12 for 25 (three-pointers) and we fouled them for three more. So, good for them. I know what basketball means in the state of Kentucky. You’re going to have a team that’s fun to cheer for. I’ll tell you that.”
As it turned out, Kentucky, now 4-0 for the season, became the first team in school history to make at least 10 three-pointers in each of its first four games. Overall, the Wildcats hit 54.8 percent from the field, 48 percent on three-point field goals and 81 percent from the free-throw line.
The 6-foot-6 Robinson, who played two years for UK coach Mark Pope at Brigham Young, led the Wildcat attack with season highs of 20 points and seven rebounds. Point guard Lamont Butler added a season-high 16 points.
The Wildcats also had several other players who performed well. Otega Oweh, who has hit double figures in every game, scored 14 points. Seven-footer Amari Williams narrowly missed a double-double with nine points and a game-high 11 rebounds. Koby Brea, who has gunned in 15 of 19 three-pointers this season, hit 12 points, making all 3 three-pointers, along with seven rebounds.
Coming off a one-point, one-rebound performance in 27 minutes during UK’s 77-72 win over No. 6 Duke last week, Robinson is pleased to see his bounce-back performance against Lipscomb.
“I feel like everybody felt my frustration after the game,” said Robinson, who was Big 12 Sixth Man of the Year last season. “I was happy we won; it was a great win. Biggest win of my career honestly. So, there’s always a good side to it. But, just being the leader that I am, especially stepping into that role this year, I just wanted to play through for my team.”
After a big upset over the Blue Devils, there were some concerns that Kentucky could suffer an emotional letdown against the Bisons of the Atlantic Sun Conference (ASUN) even though the Wildcats are loaded with experience. Pope said the team doesn’t worry about that.
“We had this conversation earlier today with the (UK) broadcast team,” said Pope. “We don't stress, like we don't get nervous, we don't worry because it doesn't actually work. Sometimes we think if a team has a letdown after a big win, it's like, oh man, if the coach had just thought about the possibility of it being a letdown and prepared this team for no letdown, it wouldn't have happened. What happens is we all just overkill, right? We just start pushing that narrative so hard with our team. We don't actually do it at all.
“We are always going to be focused on what we need to do. And so, we really work hard. It's human nature to worry about that a little bit. We really work hard to focus on what we are trying to do. Our guys are really hungry to get better, we are hungry to become a great team. We don't have a lot of time to do it.
“So, the last game was over and it was kind of onto like, how can we get better? How can we get better? That's the only thing we talk about. And the biology of that, the neuroscience of that is 100 percent in support of that. Right? You know, we are not going to focus on what we don't want to have happen, we are going to focus on what we do want to have happen.
“And our guys have received that really well. We did not spend much time on that at all, and we won't, that's not the way we do it. That doesn't mean we won't ever have bad results. It just means that we are going to always focus on what we are trying to do and we are going to try to be laser focused on that. We are not going to spend a lot of time thinking about what we do not want to have happen.”
Kentucky will face Jackson State at Rupp Arena Friday night. The 7 p.m. ET game will be seen on SEC Network+.
Jamie H. Vaught, a longtime sports columnist in Kentucky, is the author of six books about UK basketball, including recently-published “Forever Crazy About The Cats: An Improbable Journey of a Kentucky Sportswriter Overcoming Adversity.” Now a retired college professor who taught at Southeast Kentucky Community and Technical College in Middlesboro., he is the editor and founder of KySportsStyle.com Magazine. You can follow him on Twitter @KySportsStyle or reach him via email at KySportsStyle@gmail.com.
