As if this strange season needed another strange development, Kentucky Basketball opted not to practice at Bridgestone Arena Tuesday.
For the teams that play Wednesday in the SEC Tournament, seeds 9-16, they are given the option to practice at Bridgestone Arena on Tuesday. Seven of these eight teams did.
The only one that didn’t? Kentucky.
Truthfully, this isn’t that big of a deal. But since it’s Kentucky, we’ll examine why they didn’t.
“We just wanted to reproduce the schedule of the day as best we
could, so we couldn’t do that with our slotted time there,” Mark Pope told reporters on Tuesday. “It also recreates our normal travel schedule, so we’re just trying to have our day before the game be as close in proximity to what we’ll face tomorrow as we can.”
In other words, the Cats actually practiced in Lexington today, at the same time tomorrow’s game will tip-off. It’s part of an effort to replicate the gameday schedule.
Pope said that Kentucky is going through the motions as though it is a gameday, with the exception of traveling to Nashville after practice is over.
“We’ve recreated the schedule,” Pope exclaimed. It’s just what we always do, trying to recreate the schedule. So, we had film at the same time we’ll have film tomorrow morning. We’ll start practice at exactly the same time we tip off tomorrow. And do pregame, just to kind of keep that whole routine the same, just to do the most we can to get the guys’ clocks adjusted.”
Alrighty then. There’s also this: The last time Kentucky played in Bridgestone Arena, it didn’t go well. The Wildcats were outclassed by Gonzaga 94-59, in a game the Cats shot just 16/60 from the field. Ouch.
Nontheless, the Cats will try to win five games in five days to win the SEC Tournament.
“I think it comes down to right now, our commitment to each other, our competitiveness, our fight, and how well we play,” Pope said. “A beautiful thing about the postseason is that there are no judges out there. You just have a winner and a loser, and it’s very clear, and it says it on a scoreboard, so we don’t need to overcomplicate it.
“We just need to go play great.”
It starts Wednesday afternoon. Maybe, just maybe, a run is in the Cats.
