I’ve found it’s always better to sleep on it after an emotional game before posting.
First, congratulations to CKS and OUR Coogs on a season that exceeded expectations. They got off to a slow start, found themselves in a deep hole, dug themselves out of it and had a shot to win at the end. Short of the shot going in, what more could we expect?
In watching the game, the first thing I though of was the old adage, you can’t teach height. While we have been undersized all year, we never ran into a team that had this height advantage at all five positions. It showed in the rebounding statistics.
UK made it point to ensure that if we beat them, it wasn’t going to be with Corey Davis going off on a big night from the 3 point arc as he rarely ever got a good look at the basket. When Armoni Brooks hit his first shot, I had a good feeling.
Poise. Even when they were down big, the team never panicked. CKS kept them focused and kept their heads in the game.
Officiating. I hate to complain about officiating, but it was a factor. We had 10 more fouls called against us than Kentucky did. UK would get to five fouls in each half and that was pretty much it, you weren’t going to get any more calls unless it was really egregious. We were not going to get any calls in the paint, but they fouled out two of our big men. Kentucky is a very good team, but we were playing against more than UK.
Next year. We really didn’t know what to expect when Rob Gray left, but the team stepped up. I feel that if the team, with our graduations, plays like this next year, we are moving to another level: a team that doesn’t rebuild, it reloads.
Thanks CKS and team for a great year.