By Jamie H. Vaught
First-year boss Mark Pope got his first signature win of his UK head coaching career as his Wildcats, a six-point underdog, bounced back to upset No. 6 Duke 77-72 Tuesday night at the State Farm Champions Classic in Atlanta.
Down by nine points at the intermission, No. 19 Kentucky slowly chipped away Duke’s lead throughout the second half before winning the dramatic contest, which saw nine lead changes and seven ties. It was Duke freshman star Cooper Flagg's two critical turnovers in the last 12 seconds of the game that helped the Cats win. For the second half, the Wildcats outscored the Blue Devils 40-26.
UK graduate student Andrew Carr led the Cats in the scoring department, hitting a season-high 17 points on 5-of-8 shooting along with five rebounds.
“(It was) just an unbelievable game. It was a true team effort,” said Carr in a postseason press conference. “I felt like it (the win) was really special for us. Not everything was going our way, especially in the first half. We come in at halftime, and Coach always talks about just turning into each other. The people that matter are the people in that locker room. The closer we get, it's harder and harder to break us. So I feel like we did an unbelievable job of being resilient tonight and then a really special way to come out with the win.”
Kentucky junior Otega Oweh, who had 15 points and six rebounds, made a couple of critical plays at the end with a steal and an offensive rebound along with four clutch free throws.
“Otega made an unbelievable play at the end of the game to kind of seal it with the offensive rebound,” said Carr.
Pope obviously is very pleased with his team’s comeback after a slow start.
“I was really proud of how the guys came out in the second half,” he said. “We're always trying to monitor our energy on the team. The guys are really conscious of where they're letting their minds go, right? The first half was -- the last ten minutes of the first half was really frustrating for us. We gave up 46 points. That's not characteristic of us. That's not who we are as a team. We had seven turnovers in the first half. That's not characteristic of us.
“Credit Duke. Duke's a terrific team. Come on, a ton of credit to this great Duke team. But what I was really proud of is guys went and sat in the locker room, and all it was all constructive. The guys do most of the fixing before I even get in the locker room.
“You could see that the way they came out at the start of the second half. It was just sheer resolve and determination, and there was a lot of ebb and flow. The game almost swung away from us there in that first eight minutes of the second half, and then the guys kind of reeled it in, and it was close for us.”
At the beginning of the second half, Pope talked to point guard Lamont Butler.
“Lamont is the foundation of this team,” said the coach. “If you get to know Lamont Butler, he's one of the best people I ever met. That's not an overstatement. And he is a winner. He is a winner. So we just talked about we're riding or dying together. That's how this team is.
“I feel the same way about Otega. I feel the same way about Drew. We're our guys. We're each other's guys, and we're not going away from each other. If we have a bad half or a bad play or a bad game, we're running back to each other. That was the conversation we had with Lamont. He doesn't need much. He has a winner's heart. He had an unbelievable second half. He really gave us a massive lift in the second half.”
Butler finished with nine points and four assists.
Pope is optimistic the Cats’ experience will carry the team far this winter.
“I like our group,” he said. “If we had lost this game, I would still like our group. I've been blessed to coach incredible young men. I've been incredibly blessed. This group especially, and they've been that way before we played a game in the summer.
“The guys were so intentional. These guys, nobody knew each other. Nobody had ever been with each other. They've been very intentional about getting to know each other. Three or four weeks into the summer, I had guys doing incredibly gracious, generous acts of kindness for their teammates.
“We had a bunch of stuff this summer that was tough with guys' lives outside of basketball, family stuff. I think that wins. I really think it wins in the end. These guys have been so intentional about working to love each other.”
UK’s roster is one of the most experienced in the country, but not a single player enters the season having appeared in a game for the Wildcats. UK features six fifth-year players, tying for the third-most in college basketball among the power conferences. Only Oklahoma State (eight) and Louisville (seven) have more.
For the game, the Wildcats, who hit 40.3 percent of their field goals, held Duke to 39.4 percent shooting from the field. They have held their opponent under 40 percent from the floor in all three games thus far this season.
Kentucky, which improved its mark to 3-0, also had 25 points from the bench, outscoring Duke’s reserves 25-6. The Wildcats also blocked a season-high eight shots.
Cooper Flagg of Duke scored a game-high 26 points.
The next game for the Wildcats is Tuesday, Nov. 19 when they meet Lipscomb at Rupp Arena. The 7 p.m. (ET) matchup 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.
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