On Tuesday, Alabama hosts Kentucky at Coleman Coliseum. It gets started at 9:00 EST and you can see it on ESPN. The Crimson Tide are 1-5 against the Wildcats over the last four years. They fell 77-71 on 1/21/2012, the last time they met.

Kentucky and Alabama share the 3rd spot in the conference.

The 15 points by Trevor Releford helped the Crimson Tide to a 50-49 victory over Texas A&M on January 19th. On top of his scoring average of 16.2 points per game, he delivers 2.6 assists per game. For the Wildcats, Kyle Wiltjer finished with 17 points and 5 assists in the 75-53 blowout of Auburn on January 19th. He contributes 4.4 rebounds per game in addition to his 11.3 points per game.

Kentucky has a statistical edge over Alabama in one specific area, scoring, where the Wildcats have the upper hand over the Crimson Tide, 77 points per game to 65 points per game. Kentucky will hope to exploit their strength in effective field goal percentage in this matchup. Their mark of 54.1 in this area ranks 2nd in the conference and 24th in the country.

Kentucky StatSmack

  • Alabama is bigger. The average weight of the top 8 players on Alabama is 220 lbs compared to 212 lbs for Kentucky.
  • Tuscaloosa isn't as congested as Lexington (population is significantly lower).
  • Trevor Releford is ranked 5th in the SEC in steals.
  • You'll do better on next semester's exams, right? Alabama currently has a higher Academic Progress Rate (984 to 963) than Kentucky, per the NCAA.
  • Alabama is a better free-throw-shooting team (70.1% vs 63.3%) than Kentucky this season.
  • Alabama is better under pressure, and has defeated Kentucky in 4 out of the last 5 games decided by 5 points or fewer.
  • The Alabama basketball team finishes what they start, with a better graduation rate than Kentucky (75% vs 44%).
  • Alabama players are more experienced than Kentucky players (9,219 minutes played vs 6,387 minutes played).
  • At least you keep showing up. Alabama has an average margin of victory of 7 over Kentucky in 17 wins since 1980.