Kentucky Basketball falls to Tennessee Vols: 3 things to know, box score and postgame banter

The Kentucky Wildcats fought valiantly against the Tennessee Volunteers, but in the end, came up on the wrong end of a 61-59 defeat.

Here are three things to know:

As back-and-forth as it gets

This game was as up-and-down as it could be, and the parity was incredible. There were 13 ties and 17 lead changes, and each team led for more then 13 minutes of game play. As ugly as it was, it was very close for 40 minutes and a fun game in the final minutes, until UK lost of course.

Quade Green leads the Cats in first half

UK had an ugly first half, scoring just 26 points and shooting just 38 percent. But it was thanks to Green that the team was still within a point at the half. Green was 4-of-4 from the field in the first half and 2-of-2 from 3-point range. He led the team with 10 points at the break (no other Wildcat even had five) and he also had two rebounds. With his help, Kentucky made six of its last seven shots from the field in the first half. Part of those last seven shots was a layup that capped off an 8-2 Kentucky run, keeping the Wildcats in the game.

Kevin Knox’s and-one...

Let’s just take a moment to talk about what has to be a SportsCenter Top 10 play.

I could watch this for days. There’s not any better way to execute an in-bounds. Knox struggled for much of the game but came on stronger in the second half. He had eight points in the second half and finished with 10. He was 3-of-11 from the field and 0-of-3 from 3-point range. He did have another and-one later in the second half, but it wasn’t enough for UK to avoid this painful defeat.

Here is the final box score:

Now, once again, let’s all take a deep breath and talk about what just happened.