Kentucky Wildcats v. Georgia Bulldogs: Haphazard Ill-Informed Roundball Preview Tackles Hoop Hounds' SEC Basketball Opener

It’s not Coach Cal’s X’s and O’s, it’s all about his Jimmys and his Joes. He has some of the best talent to wear a college uniform. The biggest problem they have is youth. The same types of mistakes that we talk about our Dawg football team having with a redshirt freshman QB are the same types of mistakes that UK has on their basketball team.

Defeating the Wildcats from the Bluegrass state will honestly be a daunting task. There’s the mental aspect of the game that says historically, the Dawgs won’t win. Combine that with the fact that Coach Fox doesn’t routinely get the same type of talent that Coach Cal gets, mix in a healthy dose of chip on the shoulder that Coach Cal has surely instilled into his youngsters and you have a big win if the Dawgs can pull it off.
What will it take? Coach Fox will have to have all his cunning up and running and and that includes Travis Leslie. He needs to crate some turnovers and then get out and run and even throw down a highlight dunk or two. Those types of things allow everybody’s favorite uncle, Uncle Mo Mentum to take his seat firmly on the Red and Black bench. It also helps to deflate that chip on the shoulder.
The Dawgs must also play smart in the half court. Turnovers are always a key, but I believe they are more key when you are playing a team like the Wildcats. If UGA has over 15, it’s probably a long night on the scoreboard. You just can’t give that team that many opportunities, when you do you allow Uncle Mo to move to the opposing bench.
Aside from the occasional Travis Leslie highlight, the Dawgs probably need to slow the game down and play ball control. Don’t give UK the opportunity to score 100+, limit them to possessions to allow only around 60 points. We have enough firepower to win a 60 point game, I’m not convinced we can win the high scoring ones.
Rebounding is always key in any basketball game. So TKK, you are correct in stating that the rebounding battle will be an important battle to watch for the entire 40 minutes. Can our big men put enough body on the Bluegrass state Cats to keep their high jumpin’ paws from grabbing a double digit rebounding advantage? That remains to be seen. If so, expect this to be an epic battle of Cats and Dawgs.

With experience on the side of the Dawgs and what I perceive to be a burning desire to be automatic for the people of Dawgnation, Georgia has an opportunity to catch the Wildcats in an early conference contest to which they will not be accostumed. The Cats on the other hand want to open SEC play with a statement, it always makes winning later a little easier. They are also looking to justify that chip on the shoulder. On top of all that, as noted above, the state of Kentucky eats, sleeps, breathes, drinks, sings, grows, smokes, and prays basketball 24/7/365. Quite frankly, the last two battles of Dawgs and Cats I have attended in the Stegasaurus have been dominated by way too much blue for my liking inside the old gym and that makes playing in Athens too close to a home game. Coach Fox may have done enough earlier this season to eliminate that factor, combined with the fact that the game can be seen on local TV, that always brings students to the game in their most rowdy fashion.

Leonard’s Loser, in a close one, UK.