Mark Pope’s team must find a new way to win games

On By Littum

NEW YORK — We’ve seen how well Kentucky basketball player and how high it can soar when going fast and hitting on all cylinders. The lead the NCAA in scoringwith an average of 91.3 points per game, and spun off 10 wins in non-conference play.

These up-tempo showcases aren’t the kind of games the Wildcats always want to participate in SEC play and certainly not when the postseason rolls around and every possession matters in the NCAA tournament.

UK just learned what it’s like when the 3-pointers don’t fall and the shots don’t come as many during their 85-65 loss to Ohio State in the CBS Sports Classic at Madison Square Garden.

“We have to find other ways when the ball doesn’t go in,” said UK guard Otega Oweh, who scored a team-high 21 points. “Defensively, I feel like we could spark some energy there, maybe get some easy baskets, create turnovers, but unfortunately we didn’t.”

The Cats need alternative ways to win games apart from putting immense pressure on their opponents from scoring quickly and easily. To put it simply, they need to learn how to win an ugly, low-possession game.

Ohio State had just been embarrassed 91-53 by Auburn a week ago in Atlanta. But the Buckeyes took a much more deliberate approach to separating the Cats. Head coach Jake Diebler was purposeful in how he slowed the tempo at times as a way to take UK out of their offense.

Kentucky had just 67 possessions against Ohio State and scored just .970 points per game.

“We tried to shrink the game a little bit with some of our offensive possessions and felt like we needed to get them to guard further in the half court in those moments,” Diebler said. “It’s a respect for what they’ve been able to do.”

Kentucky is feeling a lot more respected this season.

It won’t be the last time an opponent, perhaps less talented, resorts to milking possessions out of play to limit the Cats.

A lot of teams don’t want someone like Ohio State’s Bruce Thornton taking shots. UK coach Mark Pope singled out Thornton, who dropped 30 points in the game, for exploiting the Cats defense after they cut a 15-point second-half deficit to six.

Pope said Thornton took advantage of a “schematic problem” he needs to address. Pope had pressed UK’s big to the point of the screen, but when Thornton rejected his screener, it left the lane open for drives.

“We tried a lot of different scheme changes and at the end of the day, Thornton was too good for us,” Pope said. “… Everything we tried, he seemed to have a pretty good answer for us.”

The game was similar in some ways to the Cats’ only other loss of the season.

Kentucky also fell short of the 70-point mark in its 70-66 setback at Clemson, in the first real road game of the season.

The Tigers played more physical than any UK opponent, and the Buckeyes duplicated some of that tough play.

“We just knew that pushing the ball was going to be a key factor,” Thornton said.

That led the Cats to a pair of season lows, shooting 29.8% from the field and making just four 3-pointers en route to 18% shooting from behind the arc. The previous low field goal percentage was 38.1% against Clemson, and they were held to seven 3s against Clemson, Gonzaga and Georgia State.

Those percentages alone weren’t what led to the loss.

UK attacked the basket enough to earn 32 trips to the free throw line, which was second this season only to its 42 attempts against Western Kentucky.

But the Cats allowed Ohio State to shoot 57% from the floor. It was the first time this season that Great Britain allowed a team to shoot better than 50%.

These are the kinds of neutral games that will determine how quickly the season ends in March. UK fans turning Madison Square Garden into Rupp Arena Northeast, where many Buckeyes fans presumably saw their football team in the playoffs, couldn’t even help matters.

“We just could never find the pace of the game,” Pope said.

Clemson and now Ohio State have provided a blueprint, and it’s up to UK to figure out how to turn a slower pace into a winner.

Well sports columnist CL Brown at [email protected]follow him on X at @CLBrownHoops and sign up for his newsletter at profile.courier-journal.com/newsletters/cl-browns-latest to make sure you never miss one of his columnsp.