Kentucky Wildcats Morning Quickies: Quade Green Edition

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen of the Big Blue Nation. I’ll be your host for the Quickies today, moving over from my usual Tuesday spot due to a massive 10-hour Internet outage at and around Logan House.

Today, we are in the process of saying farewell to Quade Green, the second mid-season John Calipari transfer I can remember. The first was early in Cal’s tenure. Stacey Poole was part of the 2011 recruiting class, and he decided to leave shortly after the season began. Ultimately, he played in 16 games before moving on to Georgia Tech, where he essentially flopped. This Courier-Journal article lists all Calipari-era transfers and discusses their ultimate success or failure.

There is no doubt in my mind that Green will be far more successful than Poole, perhaps as successful as Charles Matthews, who transferred after the 2016 season. Matthews is a senior this season at Michigan, where he has already played in a Final Four and has to be considered a favorite to get to another this year.

Green had a solid season his freshman year and was the best 3-point shooter on a poor-shooting team. This season, Green has been plagued by turnovers and defensive lapses, but he still shoots the ball well. He just doesn’t seem to have a role on this team that he’s willing to live with. His minutes are down significantly, and his positive impact on this team has been spotty, considering everything. His prospects for getting more playing time seem to be receding given the better size and defensive ability of the current and incoming class, so it seems logical for him to transfer.

I’ll miss Quade, and I know the rest of us will as well. I have no doubt he will do well wherever he winds up, and we wish him only the best in the future.

Tweet of the Morning

Your Quickies:

Kentucky football

• Oscar Combs continues his oral history of Kentucky sports:

• Penn St. writer John McGonigal of the Centre Daily breaks down the UK-Penn St. matchup in the Citrus Bowl, and warns that you can’t overlook Kash Daniel, who “backs up his talk.” Larry Vaught has the story at Vaught’s Views.
• Only one Sports Illustrated writer predicts a victory for Kentucky in the Citrus Bowl.
• Kentucky’s Josh Allen isn’t just a consensus All-American, he’s a unanimous All-American.
• Black Shoe Diaries (SB Nation’s Penn St. site) has “Game changers” for each team listed for both offense and defense.
• Larry Brown Sports lists the college football teams in need of a bowl victory, and guess who is on that list? Yeah, I know, guessing isn’t really necessary, is it?

Kentucky basketball

• Nope.

Neither is VMI losing it’s last five in a row, and getting beat by Presbyterian (Kenpom #276) 103-70.

Kentucky just isn’t very good right now.

• It’s rare to score 3,000 points in state high school basketball. Dontaie Allen did it the right way.
• Cats Illustrated has a round-table discussion of Quade Green’s transfer.
• With Green leaving, the pressure (and minutes) for Ashton Hagans and Immanuel Quickley will ramp up.
• Beating Louisville looks quite a bit more difficult today than at the beginning of the season. I agree, but the Cardinals did not look good at all last night against Lipscomb.

Other Kentucky sports

• Two volleyballers earn second-team All-American honors, and two more are recognized as honorable mention All-Americans.

Links posts

• The Leach Report: Thursday Wildcat Links

College football

• Calls to expand the College Football Playoff are getting louder. Who could’ve predicted that? < / sarcasm >

College basketball

• Never in a college game. Next question.

Other sports news

• Only Michael Jordan could get away with smacking Malik Monk upside the head, not once but twice, and getting him to smile. This just made me giggle.

• Big milestone in history:

Oh, hell no we can’t let this go without the entire scene:

• Awesome.

• Some familiar names here.

Other news

• NASA’s InSight Mars lander snaps a selfie.
• Dracula ants? Yikes!
• Scientists discover seemingly impossible material based on silicon.