Kentucky at Florida -- Quick impressions

I know this is a tough time and I usually feel like I've been kicked in the balls when my team loses.  I'm not here to gloat, although BeatUL will have to deal with some unpleasant quotations in my comments for awhile.

Please do not visit my website right now.  I had to vent a little pent-up joy and I'm sure I'll be more reasonable in the morning.

Nothing is as bad as it seems...  nothing.  Kentucky fans knew this was a rebuilding year going in.  Perhaps P-Pat will now have a smoldering hatred of the Gators in future contests.  Hope not...  that guy's a terror, even if he had an off night.

Our youngsters were fortunate to win this one, especially with our abysmal free throw shooting.  (Jeezus, I almost threw a chair threw my television when Calathes missed two, got the rebound, then missed that shot too.)

Good luck 'Cats.

And I think it did, obviously.  Kentucky's advantage was experience, but unfortunately the guys with the most of that (seniors Bradley and Crawford) are also some of the least "basketball intelligent" players I've ever seen play the game.  

Patterson happened to catch Mo Speights on a night that the big 6'10" sophomore decided to flip the switch.  I don't recall the number of rejections that Speights had on P-Pat, but it was a lot.  Speights more or less had his way with Patterson in much the same way P-Pat did with A.J. Ogilvy of Vanderbilt.  It was a bit of a mismatch, actually, and Speights used his extra 2 inches on Patterson to full advantage.  (I was frankly amazed and shocked by this.)  It was Speights' best game of the year by far, but he'll have to keep the heat turned on.

Jasper played and contributed some big shots at key moments, and Meeks played hard and long enough to foul out, so while I'll grant you that they were no doubt something less than full strength after having sat out most of the week in practice, the fact is that they did play and they did help the Cats in their attempt to win.

Our freshmen and sophomores are simply really good, and they won this game despite TERRIBLE free throw shooting in regulation.  A lot of that's talent, but you can't overlook coaching.  How is it that our kids, who were playing high school ball last winter can take on a squad of guys who have been getting college level strength and conditioning training for 2-4 years...  and win?  The answer is coaching.  Billy Donovan is simply a master coach and he had a beautiful gameplan in place for this year's version of the 'Cats.

So I think your premise is slightly flawed.  Florida is young but they're quite good and Kentucky from top to bottom simply isn't quite at their level right now.  That might change in time, and maybe even this year as Meeks and Jasper get back in shape, but for now that's the simple truth.

From wikipedia:

Ignoring the final losing season -- Tubby managed 22-12 with no win over a team in the RPI top 30 -- this is the scenario we are going through right now, very much so.

This isn't to say that I take losing lightly. And in some ways, losing overtime/close games makes the losing even more unbearable.

But to wit, Ramel Bradley has played THE LAST FOUR GAMES in their entirety. Re-read that again. That is just preposterous.

Pat Patterson has played nearly the last three, Crawford, too.

And while Meeks and Jasper are "back," both look to be playing at about 40-50% of their abilities due to conditioning and nagging injury.

And yet you continue to claim that "...what can I say?  It would be ... irresponsible of me not to face the real fact that we cannot seem to win, even when we have personnel advantages."

Advantages over whom? Any experience "Advantage" we would have is lost when your player is gassed by halftime. Any "Advantage" we might have over a freshman backcourt is lost when two probable starters have played a combined 304 of a possible 640 minutes.

Think UF's record might be different if Calathes and Hodge missed half their games? What about if you just took two starters off any team?

This is not to imply that the injuries are the cause of losing, nor that to apply some sort of excuse to losing. No, we just have no margin for error. And combine that with a staggering amount of errors (turnovers, fouling three-point shooters, lack of guarding backdoor and pick n' roll plays...) and you have a 7-9 record.

As much as I'd love it to be different, this year is going to be about praying Patterson returns, establishing a mindset of defense and competitiveness that -- looking back on Tubby's 7-9 finish to 2007 -- was already much in decline.

Howland had also not won at a "traditional" power school, had never reached more than a Sweet 16, was often criticized as "too harsh" or "tough-nosed" and what we've seen is that he instilled a winning mindset that was lacking, despite Steve Lavin's generally successful Elite Eight and Sweet 16 runs at UCLA.

Through the looking glass, Howland has reached back-to-back Final Fours, with a good shot -- Saturday's loss notwithstanding -- to reach another.

What price are we willing to pay? We have to have faith, because based on what we're seeing from this year's Cats, that's about the only thing we have left ...

GP- Billy D isnt a MASTER coach. That is one of the most rediculous statments I have ever heard. Is he a good coach YES. Did his teams always underachieve before he hired Larry Schyatt YES.  I know he has one two chips but it was with the same group of players. Im going to have to see another few deep deep runs with several different squads before I call him a master.

Donovan arrived at a school with little basketball success and took them to a Sweet 16 in his 3rd season and a Final Four (ended up NCAA Runner Ups) in his fourth.  Since his arrival, Florida has won outright or tied for an SEC title four separate times, won two SEC tourneys and made the NCAA tournament 9 straight times.

Oh, yeah.  He also won two NCAA national championships.

This 'underachieving' nonsense should be dead and buried by now.  From 2001-2005 we had two teams that failed to advance past the first round of the NCAA tournament, despite the fact that one (the 2002 team) tied for an SEC title and the other (2004) came in 2nd in the conference.  The 2001 team made it to the second round and again tied for the conference championship, posting a 24-7 record, and the '03 team went 25-8 before dying in the second round.

Disappointing?  Yes, but hardly the kind of disappointment BBN is now enduring at the hands of Billy Gillispie. Indictments of some sort of deep-seated inability on Donovan's part?  Hell, no.  These teams' NCAA berths were never seriously in doubt and I believe Kentucky fans can now appreciate just how difficult it is to go to the Big Dance year in and year out.

Kentucky fans like to say that Donovan captured lightning in a bottle with our '04s and that magical roster which won back-to-back national championships.  Perhaps so, but it wasn't Donovan's first taste of success.  The 2000 NCAA runner-ups featured a roster built by Donovan and was no fluke, either, going 29-8 for another piece of the SEC title.

What is truly amazing is what Donovan has done this year.  I overlook the 16-3 overall record because I, as well as any objective observer, recognize that the schedule was designed to give our young squad confidence going into conference play.  What I do take great pride in is the fact that the Gators are 3-1 in SEC competition, separated from perfection by only 2 points -- that road loss to Ole Miss.

It's one thing to wrangle a Top 1 or Top 2 recruiting class and manage to have freshmen that can contribute right away.  To have them playing cohesive team ball and stepping up the level that they have at this early point in their careers is a function of a master coach, because Donovan has accomplished far too much at age 42 to be 'lucky'.  A Sweet 16, 3 championship games and two national titles in 9 years is a hell of a long way from underachieving, my friend.

I contend that he is a master coach, one of the best to ever coach the game, and a future Hall of Famer.