Kentucky Basketball: Do the Wildcats Need a Go-to Scorer?

To numbers junkies and analytics aficionados, what Kentucky is doing with its platoon system is mind-boggling. But numbers and data sets don't win games—clutch players do.

Kentucky doesn't have a true go-to player at this point, partly because it hasn't needed to and the sermon that head coach John Calipari has preached about balance and benevolence.

Yet at some point during the Wildcats' quest for perfection, a situation will arise that calls for one player—not five—to put the team on his shoulders and carry it to victory.

Kentucky's leading scorer is junior Willie Cauley-Stein, who is averaging 10.7 points but is only playing 24.5 minutes per game. That's also a team high, as the platoon system has resulted in 10 players logging at least 13.7 minutes.

The loss of junior Alex Poythress to season-ending knee surgery seems to have scrapped the two-groups-of-five approach for the time being.

Calipari has been very candid about the platoon, often saying that it will last as long as it needs to and can be scrapped at any time when certain players struggle or prove deserving of extra minutes.

"I'm not going to take minutes away from a player just to platoon," Calipari told Kyle Tucker of the Louisville Courier-Journal on Thursday. "If we get to the point where eight of those guys or seven have separated from the rest, it'll be pretty cut-and-dried...and those guys will play."

Those comments are more related to dropping people who aren't performing well out, but they don't address the idea of having one or two guys as the primary scorers.

Players	Times led (or was tied for lead) in scoring
Devin Booker	3
Willie Cauley-Stein	3
Aaron Harrison	2
Karl-Anthony Towns	2
Andrew Harrison	1
Dakari Johnson	1
Trey Lyles	1
Tyler Ulis	1

Cauley-Stein has twice tied for the scoring lead and has one outright high individual score when he had a Kentucky season-best 21 points in the 63-51 win over Texas. That was the Wildcats' toughest game to date, and the 7-footer responded by making nine of 12 free throws and chipping in 12 rebounds, five steals and three blocks.

That performance, as well as a stat-stuffing game last time out against North Carolina, makes Cauley-Stein the best option for being a go-to scorer. There are plenty of other reasons:

Andy Lyons/Getty Images

• He's the veteran. With Poythress out, Cauley-Stein is the lone upperclassman. He's been through the good (reaching the title game last season) and bad (failing to make the NCAA tournament in 2012-13) and can feed off the experiences of both to influence his play and younger teammates.
• He can do so much. Cauley-Stein not only leads the team in scoring but also rebounding (6.8). Furthermore, he has a team-high 19 steals and his 62.3 percent shooting is second to Dakari Johnson.
• He doesn't run hot and cold. Though he's scored as few as five points in a game this season, that was against Montana State and the final margin in that contest was 58 points. Every other player to lead or share the team lead in scoring in a game has had an off game, with guards Aaron and Andrew Harrison each having many with their continued struggles shooting from outside.

The beauty of Kentucky's system is that it doesn't require one or two players to handle the majority of the scoring, but that option needs to be there.

With the rotation down to nine players due to Poythress' injury, only four players were subbed in at a time early on against North Carolina, allowing for a "hot" player to stay on the court longer.

As the season goes on, the opportunity for longer stretches of play for the more dynamic players should increase.

Being able to wear down opponents with constant substitutions of fresh bodies will remain a deadly weapon, but there will come times when an even more effective asset will be one player who can be turned to each and every night for clutch scoring.

Follow Brian J. Pedersen on Twitter at @realBJP.