Today's News
The Lexington Herald-Leader's Jerry Tipton previews the Cats' Wednesday home tilt vs. the Auburn Tigers. A reasonable mind could certainly suggest that Auburn's victory at South Carolina was more a result USC's looking ahead to the Cats than anything that Auburn did. And with no one over 6'6" on their roster (apologies to freshman C Ryan Daniel, who is 6'11" but plays minimal minutes), look for Randolph Morris to continue his sparkling ascension out of mediocrity and into the headlines with his biggest game of the season.
As for the point that Tipton mentions regarding Auburn's reliance on the 3-pointer, only Vanderbilt among SEC teams has attempted more 3's than Coach Jeff Lebo's Tigers, and all but 4 teams in the SEC, have made a greater percentage of their attempts. Maybe that has something to do with Lebo's research of Auburn's all-time worst teams.
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Gregg Doyle of CBS Sportsline predicts that Tubby Smith will be among the current crop of NCAA coaches to earn Hall of Fame status if he keeps up his current pace. Can't argue with that, but I can argue that Bob Huggins and Bo Ryan belong on that same list.
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The Cincinnati Post's Victoria Sun writes about the apparent coming-of-age of PF Randolph Morris. Victoria agrees with me that Morris seems likely to continue his stellar play against the vertically-challenged Auburn frontline on Wednesday night. While I'm still not of the opinion that Morris seems 'cerebral' on the court (a description that Randolph's dad, Ralph, makes in this article), I am certainly glad to see his more assertive play inside. He, to me, is the key to the Cats post-season hopes. An aggressive, effective Morris gives the Cats Final Four potential.
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Ben Roberts at the Kentucky Kernel profiles the Cats' resident kleptomaniac, Rajon Rondo. The amazing frosh will tie Wayne Turner's single-season record for steals in a regular season by averaging 4 per game over the team's final four games.
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Jimmy Debutts at the Birmingham Post-Herald looks back at Auburn's implosion on Saturday in Athens. Continuing a pervasive theme, Auburn's only hope at a road SEC win is shooting greater than 50% from behind the arc (which they did in Columbia in their only road SEC win). My guess is that going 1-17 from the 3-point line, shooting 55% from the line, being outrebounded by 8, out-assisted by 7, and committing 10 more fouls than your opponent won't add up to success very often.
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In Larry Vaught's Danville Advocate-Messenger mailbag, he echoes a reader's dismay that the UK student section is so restrained from celebrating by the 'rigid rules' enforced by Rupp Arena. Call me spoiled, but the only time I believe that any storming of any kind is well-founded by the UK student body is when the Cats punch their ticket to the Final Four or cut down the nets in the championship game. In those two situations, I do not just think it's appropriate to storm the Euclid/Woodland intersection, I think that any students found not to be celebrating in the streets should be expelled.
posted by Scott | 9:15 AM
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