Kentucky Basketball: Would Wins in Remaining Nonconference Games Guarantee 40-0?
You may find the notion that the Kentucky Wildcats basketball team will finish the season undefeated laughable, but there is something even more laughable than that—the rest of the SEC.
However, before Kentucky gets to beat up on the rest of its conference and its grand total of zero ranked teams, it has to navigate two difficult nonconference tilts.
The first one is a notable showdown more for the opponent’s name than the actual basketball fans have seen on the court this season, and the second one is certainly the Wildcats’ most difficult game on the entire schedule.
The Wildcats play UCLA in Chicago on Saturday as part of the CBS Sports Classic in a clash between two of the most prestigious programs in all of college sports with national title banners everywhere. Still, the Bruins are off to a disappointing start and already have three losses, and those losses were all by double digits to Oklahoma, North Carolina and Gonzaga.
Those are the only three opponents of note on what has otherwise been a soft schedule, and the Bruins fell flat in all three chances.
For context, Kentucky destroyed that same North Carolina team that beat UCLA by 22 points.
The Wildcats do have to watch out for UCLA’s rebounding prowess (the Bruins are 11th in the nation in total rebounds per game) and interior play behind Kevon Looney and Tony Parker, but Kentucky should roll against an overmatched opponent.
Then comes the showdown with archrival Louisville and the nation’s top defense, per Ken Pomeroy’s pace-adjusted rankings.
The Cardinals already stifled formidable offensive attacks from Ohio State, Minnesota and Indiana and are one of the few teams in the nation with the size and length to actually match up with Kentucky. Louisville leads the country in total rebounds per game and has a future NBA star in the making in Montrezl Harrell leading the way down low.
What’s more, this game is at Louisville in what should be the most hostile environment Kentucky faces all year. There will be a Final Four atmosphere in the KFC Yum! Center, and how some of the youngsters on the Wildcats react will go a long way toward determining the outcome of the game.
For argument’s sake, let’s say Kentucky’s talent is too much for the Cardinals to handle, and the Wildcats enter SEC play with an unblemished record. That is when the undefeated talk will really pick up steam.
Florida has to be mentioned when discussing the rest of the SEC since it started the season in the Top 10. However, it quickly dropped out after a stunning loss to Miami, an overtime win against Louisiana Monroe, a loss to Georgetown, a loss to North Carolina and a loss to Kansas. To be fair, the Gators dealt with a number of injuries in the early going and should gradually improve as the season progresses.
Still, Billy Donovan lost four senior starters from a season ago, and the Gators are yet to prove anything this year against notable competition. The talent is there, but we haven’t seen it yet. And the losses stand out on the early resume.
As Kentucky, what else scares you outside of a potentially resurgent Gators squad in this conference?
The Wildcats don’t have to go to Arkansas, where they lost last season, Alabama already lost the three games of note it has played against Xavier, Wichita State and Iowa State and a potentially dangerous LSU squad already lost to Old Dominion and looks vulnerable on offense at best.
In a vacuum, Kentucky should win every game it plays all season until the NCAA tournament if it gets past UCLA and Louisville. It simply boasts more talent than anything the SEC has to offer (or anything outside of the NBA has to offer if we are being honest).
However, you cannot just look at every game in a vacuum because they are part of the larger tapestry that is the season as a whole. There are other factors outside of just the basketball that must be taken into consideration.
For one, the Wildcats are going to get their opponents’ A-game every single time they take the floor. That means Kentucky will see a much different version of Alabama than Ole Miss or Vanderbilt will on a sleepy Wednesday night.
We see this phenomenon in college football all the time with 18-21-year-old kids. That’s why Penn State can take Ohio State to double overtime, Arkansas can lose by a missed extra point to Alabama or Washington State can come within a missed pass-interference call of possibly tying Oregon in the final minutes.
There will be some nights when the opposition is just more motivated than Kentucky, and that could come back to haunt the Wildcats on the road in conference play in front of what promises to be raucous opposing crowds.
It can also be fatiguing over the course of a long season to get the opponent’s best shot every time, and that makes it far more likely that Kentucky will have an off night or two along the way to March Madness.
Injury is also an unpredictable factor, and it has already reared its ugly head for the Wildcats in the form of Alex Poythress.
Kentucky has the depth to withstand one or even two major injuries (after all, it already destroyed North Carolina in its first game without Poythress), but even the mighty Wildcats can only survive so much attrition. There is not as much depth in the backcourt as the frontcourt, and an injury to someone like Aaron Harrison would be devastating to the Wildcats’ national title chances.
Ultimately, the odds are still stacked against Kentucky finishing the season undefeated because there are so many unpredictable factors to take into account over the course of a long season. That means a perfect nonconference slate does not guarantee a 40-0 record.
Still, if it can make it past UCLA and Louisville’s suffocating defense, college basketball fans need to start accepting a perfect season as a legitimate possibility.
The rest of the SEC is just that bad.
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