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Kentucky Wildcats: Morning Quickies - 1996 Untouchables Edition

News and commentary from around the Big Blue Internet. 1996 Wildcats to get rings on Wednesday. Bat Cats' recent win makes SportsCenter highlights. Mark Stoops talks about his father. Alabama offers 8th grader. More.

USA TODAY Sports

The 1996 Wildcats will be getting rings to commemorate their victory in the NCAA Tournament. That's awesome, and there will be something like 15 of them on hand for the ceremony Wednesday at halftime.

Tweet of the Morning:

You have got to love this.

Your Quickies:

Kentucky football
  • Stoops' Father Helps Keep Mark Grounded // LEX18

    "The thing that comes to mind very quickly is for my Dad, he doesn’t have to say much but he would just look at me a certain way and say keep things in perspective. And that’s a big thing with him. Have some humility about what you do."

    Good advice from Mark Stoops’ dad, Ron.

Kentucky basketball
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College football
College basketball
  • Top KenPom Movers: Princeton, Vanderbilt, Northwestern // Big Apple Buckets
  • Back To The Basket -- A weekly look around college basketball // ESPN

    "The biggest thing that is scariest about stats is that it doesn’t necessarily judge what a person’s capable of, it judges what they normally do," Butler coach Brad Stevens said. "And I think that’s something that you have to weigh because we all know that in basketball, there are certain days when a guy that hasn’t made a shot for a month starts feeling better about himself. And he makes two or three in a row. You’ve got to be able to adjust on the fly. You have to have a good idea about what somebody’s capable of but also what they normally do from a trend standpoint."

    Stephens is a smart cookie. Statistics, especially advanced statistics, are very useful tools. The are not, however, a panacea, as we have said on here many times, and as many other sites have pointed out as well.

    You can’t remove the human element and replace it with a number. The numbers also don’t tell you a lot of things that they eye does.

    But one thing the numbers always give you is the truth, within their limited scope. They don’t lie. Sometimes, our eyes do. We think we see things that just aren’t there, or maybe they are, but just for a moment, a half, or a game.

    What I really like, though, is seeing the per-possession stats, like Kenpom.com, finally get their due. It was inevitable, but the inertia among the coaching community was considerable. That inertia is now being overcome, and gaining a momentum of its own.

  • Big 12 to review last minute of Kansas-Iowa State game, coordinator of officials says // ESPN

    At issue was a block or charge call that wasn’t made when Elijah Johnson drove inside as Kansas trailed 90-88 with five seconds remaining. Iowa State’s Georges Niang appeared to have his feet set, but no call was made as Johnson made contact with Niang.

    To me, this looked like a charge. People questioning the validity of this win would seem to be justified, in my opinion.

    This goes back to the accountability of officials. Why do we have to wait days to have some supervisor claim that it was a judgment call?

  • Low scoring the new normal in college basketball // CBSSports.com

    You can see successful hands-off coaching by looking at Duke’s system where they score 79 ppg or Indiana (No. 2 in ppg). Both programs allow players to make off-the-cuff decisions and flow with their play.

    To me, this is somewhat hilarious. I do agree with the general premise that coaching can slow down a ball game and keep the scoring low. But mostly what causes low-scoring games is just plain bad basketball.

    I think a lot of the low scoring these days goes back to two things – lack of midrange shooting (today’s players spend too much time on dunks and threes) and a much bigger emphasis on defense.

  • 3-point shot: Accountability for officials // ESPN

    Andy Katz gets it right with respect to the officials. The fact that the are so insulated from criticism and public accountability for mistakes is inconsistent and wrong.