By Jamie H. Vaught
KySportsStyle.com Magazine
Some leftovers from the SEC Tournament in Nashville.....
--Kentucky sure experienced the highs and lows in the SEC Tournament within 24 hours or so.
After a memorable victory which saw Otega Oweh hit a game-winning jumper with less than one second left, helping the Cats to a thrilling 85-84 victory over Oklahoma on Thursday night, UK came up with a deflating setback on Friday night, dropping to fifth-ranked Alabama by 29 points, an embarrasing 99-70 decision.
The blowout loss to Alabama was UK's worst of the season. Back in December, the Wildcats suffered an 85-65 setback to Ohio State in New York City. Also, it was UK's third loss to Alabama this season.
During his postgame press conference, Kentucky coach Mark Pope obviously wasn't happy with his team's performance. The 22-11 Wildcats, playing without injured point guard Lamont Butler, hit only 37.5 percent of their field goals while committing 16 turnovers as Alabama had 11 steals.
"Congratulations to Alabama, they played a great game tonight," said Pope. "(Crimson Tide) were aggressive tonight. Played well. Had a good pace. We were frustrated with our performance tonight. I was disappointed. The whole night we were a little stagnant in terms of playing in the character of the way that we play. Tons of credit to Alabama. Some disappointment in our response to the moment."
Playing without Butler made things more difficult for the Wildcats. Kentucky's Amari Williams said, "Lamont is a big piece to our team. We did miss him out there. It's not like we haven't played that
team before without Lamont. I don't really feel like that's why the outcome was the way it was."
Andrew Carr, who scored a team-high 18 points, agreed with Williams. "I second what he said," commented Carr.
However, Butler is expected to recover and play in the NCAA Tournament next week.
On Kentucky's woes, Alabama coach Nate Oats said, "Obviously, it's a thinner Kentucky team. They've got a lot of injuries with (Jaxson) Robinson out for the year. And then (Otega) Oweh got hurt a little bit. Only played 20 minutes. We were fortunate that they weren't as deep as us. They're not the full strength. They're kind of down, especially in their backcourt. I thought our guards really took advantage of the fact that they were a little bit thin in the backcourt tonight."
The Crimson Tide, who face Florida in the tourney semifinals Saturday, are now looking to win their third SEC Tournament title in the last five seasons under Oats.
--Oklahoma coach Porter Moser, whose team dropped a heartbreaker to Kentucky, says the Wildcats will be dangerous in the Big Dance.
"In terms of Kentucky's team, they got a lot of weapons," said Moser, who wore custom-made colorful shoes signed by the late country music star Toby Keith during the tourney. "They've got two really good passing bigs. They have some elite shooters. They have (Andrew) Carr. Almost all of them can knock down threes. Everybody can shoot. It's tough to pick your poison when you're spaced out with Otega (Oweh) going downhill the way he does.
"I think they can make a long run. They got some older guys, veterans, winners. I believe their offense is hard to guard. So I think getting in this tournament, people are going to have to adjust, five out. Not too many teams have two bigs that can pass like they do. They run excellent
stuff at that five out. I think they're going to be a hard out."
On Oweh, Moser said, "I coached Otega, so I know my impression of him. He's very, very good." While at Oklahoma, Oweh played two years, including 28 starts last season when he had 19 double-digit points.
Moser, who is now in his fourth year at Oklahoma, was asked about Butler, who missed most of the game with an injured shoulder.
"Lamont's a Final Four point guard (in 2023 while at San Diego State)," said the coach. " He's done great things for them this whole year. He gives you an elite defender, he gives you a confident leader at the point. He's a terrific player. Got a lot of respect for him."
--During the postgame press conference following Kentucky's victory over Oklahoma, Coach Pope, who had bee the head coach at Brigham Young for five years before coming to Kentucky, was asked if Oweh was actually the player he had expected while recruiting him via transfer portal.
"I had the unfortunate experience of playing against Otega in Oklahoma last year (in an 82-66 loss), " he said. "So you go through five games plus of scouting him. We got to know him really well during the season. He just is an elite, elite, elite level athlete and a terrific, terrific defensive player that can really get downhill. That's what we knew about him. Then you start the recruiting process. You start talking to his mom and dad, his brother. You get to know him. Wow, this guy, you see the stuff on paper, but when you start to get to see the inside of him, it gets really exciting. I had the same experience with every sim one of the guys on this roster."
--The SEC has four of the top six teams in the latest NCAA's NET rankings. They are Auburn (2nd), Florida (4th), Tennessee (5th) and Alabama (6th). In addition, the conference leads the nation with seven schools ranked in the Top 20 and 14 in the Top 50 of the NET, including Kentucky at No. 13. The NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Committee uses the NET rankings to help with the tournament seedings and at-large invitations.
As far as the NCAA Tournament is concerned, I'm somewhat hopeful the Wildcats can advance all the way to the Sweet Sixteen or better. By the way, remember winning the SEC Tournament this season is tougher than capturing the NCAA tourney?
We know Kentucky can beat anyone on a given night as the team has posted eight wins over AP Top15 teams, the most in program history. That mark is tied with 1992-93 Indiana and 1978-79 Duke for the most Top 15 wins ever in a single season.
Playing in the SEC should help UK prepare for the Big Dance.
"We talked with it since the beginning," said Pope. "It's either going to tear you to shreds or it's going to make you better. I think either team is going to decide which is going to be their path. If you had the fortitude and togetherness to make it, it can make you better. So that's the challenge."
--Auburn, currently ranked third in this week's AP Top 25 poll, is one of the leading candidates to capture the 2025 NCAA title. After his team defeated Ole Miss 62-57 Friday to advance to the semifinals of the SEC Tournament, Coach Bruce Pearl was asked about the pressure of winning and meeting the expectations.
"That's such a great question," Pearl said. "Listen, because of my faith and my relationship with my Lord, I trust Him. If this is what the plan is, I'm okay with it. Sometimes that trust takes a little bit of anxiety away. It just does. That doesn't mean it's an excuse for failure. It's not. To me, that's really, really important. I want my kids to have that. I do. They don't want to disappoint the Auburn family.
"We go to the NCAA Tournament, we don't want to disappoint the SEC. We recognize when we get 14 teams in, everybody is going to be evaluating whether we deserve 14 teams or not based on how we play in the NCAA Tournament. That's not a good barometer. We deserve 14 teams in because of what we did in the non-conference. I want all of our teams, including mine, to go in without that pressure of living up to the SEC got 14 teams in. Hey, we're Auburn. We don't have a ton of history in the NCAA Tournament, okay? I want my guys feeling like they're playing with house money, they still got something to prove.
"Those are the things I'll try to do through faith. Nobody picked us to win. Look at the preseason. If Duke is 1 and Houston is 2, were they not 1 or 2 or 3 or 4 in everybody's poll? They were. Auburn wasn't. We didn't deserve to be. We are now, though."
--It's interesting to note Pearl and former UK player/Athletics Director C.M. Newton, who won two Associated Press SEC Coach of the Year honors at Alabama and Vanderbilt, are the only head coaches to win the award at two different league schools. Pearl, who won the award in 2006 and 2008 at Tennessee and twice at Auburn in 2022 and 2025, is tied with Newton for the second-most AP SEC Coach of the Year awards all-time, one behind Adolph Rupp’s five at Kentucky.
--As you may know, former Morehead State standout Johni Broome of Auburn was honored as SEC Player of the Year by the Associated Press and the league’s coaches this week. Broome joins Charles Barkley (1984) and Chris Porter (1999) as the only Tigers to win the AP honor. He was named the MVP of the SEC Tournament last season.
Broome is one of the leading candidates for the national player of the year honors. Two other SEC stars -- Mark Sears of Alabama and Walter Clayton Jr. of Florida -- are also among the top candidates for the same honor.
--An interesting tidbit: Auburn is looking to become the first back-to-back SEC Tournament champion since Kentucky won four straight tourney titles from 2015-18. The Wildcats have won at least two straight tournament titles seven times. Other than UK, the only teams that have won SEC Tournament titles in consecutive seasons are Alabama (1989-91) and Florida (2005-07).
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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