Ah, that felt good. The dust has settled on Kentucky‘s double-digit victory at Auburn, but its significance has not.
The Cats moved back up in the polls with a greater leap seen in the defensive efficiency numbers, the only thing holding this team back from legitimate Final Four contention.
What does it all mean? Let’s talk about it tonight on 4-Point Play.
The hype was ridiculous entering the matchup. Fans had been camping out since the final buzzer of Auburn’s 40-point beatdown vs. South Carolina on Wednesday, 72 hours of build-up. It was a tent city in Pearlville with food trucks and games and activities as students skipped class for the all-out celebration — definitely not a Super Bowl, though.
They did their part early, filling Neville Arena as soon as the doors opened. The buzz was tangible in the hours leading up to tipoff, then even louder during pregame festivities. It felt like an event, not just a normal game.
And then it all died.
Kentucky jumped out to a quick 11-2 lead and never let it get back down to fewer than four the rest of the way. And the Cats did it in a venue where the Tigers held the longest active home winning streak in the SEC at 16 games with just three losses in three seasons for an absurd 43-3 stretch. Auburn had been winning its home games in the SEC by an average of 22.3 points per contest. A tight 9K capacity building that gets ear-piercingly loud in a hurry, it’s considered arguably the best home-court advantage in college basketball.
Every time the fans tried taking the roof off the place, though, Kentucky came up with a response. Down five with three minutes to go in the first half? Antonio Reeves 3-pointer, setting up a 10-point lead at the break. Back to five with 13 minutes remaining — by far the loudest point of the game? Reeves driving layup to silence the crowd, then again a minute later to push it back to seven, the closest it’d be the rest of the way. One final 8-0 run to cut it from 16 to eight with three minutes to go? An Adou Thiero baseline slam to seal it for good.
Considering the venue’s reputation going in, a first-time attendee would call the atmosphere underwhelming if not overrated. Kentucky controlling the game from start to finish is to blame.
Remember when the sophomore forward went nuclear in the Kansas game, going for 16 and 13 with the entire college basketball world watching? Then he went for seven points and four blocks against North Carolina in the CBS Sports Classic? He also shined with nine points, six rebounds and three assists in the team’s home loss to Tennessee.
Now he’s gone for 15 and 5, then 14 and 8 in back-to-back high-profile Saturday matchups, the first against Gonzaga and the second at Auburn.
Do you see a theme here?
Thiero is rising to the occasion in Kentucky’s biggest games, his most recent on the Plains arguably his most impressive. Want to shut up a hostile road crowd begging to erupt in hopes of willing a victory into existence? Throw down a poster slam or two and drop some jaws to the floor.
The 6-8, 222-pound wing is slowly starting to figure things out as a consistent producer on both ends. And what’s wild is he’s not even scratching the surface of what he can be, nor does he realize how close he is to superstardom.
To be completely transparent, Thiero may be the most physically gifted player in college basketball. He’s built like a Greek god with otherwordly leaping ability, looking down into the rim on dunk attempts. And while he’s not a true point guard at the next level, he’s comfortable as an initiator with ball skills who uses his quickness and strength to get paint touches with next to zero resistance. He puts himself in position to make plays.
His issue? He’s uncertain about which steps to take after that too often. Rather than going up and through, he sometimes shies away from contact, flipping shots up when he’s capable of finishing with purpose. Or he’ll hold on too long and put the ball in position to be blocked or held. He’s the strongest, most athletic person on the floor and either has no idea or simply forgets at times. It’s both hilarious and scary considering Thiero is already a productive player and regularly has moments of brilliance as is.
He’s close, but also so far away considering his ridiculous ceiling. The day he realizes he’s unguardable at this level is the day he becomes an NBA player — and a consistent jumper away from being a great one.
The Cats hit a low point following the 89-85 home loss to Gonzaga on Jan. 10, dropping all the way to No. 126 in KenPom’s defensive efficiency ratings. Their offensive numbers continued to soar sitting comfortably inside the top 10, but they graded out historically poor on the other end, specifically among Calipari-coached teams.
Then, a breakthrough against Ole Miss, holding the Rebels to 63 points on 37.5% shooting and 22.7% from three. Just a few days later, Kentucky followed it up by giving up just 59 to a top-10 offensive team nationally in Auburn, its worst scoring output since Feb. 2021. The Tigers also shot just 30.9% from the field, their worst in a home game dating back to Feb. 2016.
It was the team’s best all-around defensive effort of the season by a mile. And the analytics reflected that, the Cats jumping up to No. 102 in defensive efficiency after the first win, then up to No. 81 after the second.
A 45-spot jump in a single week.
Taking a closer look, Kentucky’s defensive efficiency was 103.2 following the Gonzaga loss, then improved to 102.0 after beating Ole Miss before settling in at 100.9 as things stand today post-Auburn — a 2.3-point difference. Another 2.3-point improvement would put the efficiency rating at 98.6, good for No. 43 nationally. That’s ahead of where Baylor was entering the 2021 NCAA Tournament (No. 44) before winning the whole thing.
This wasn’t going to be an overnight turnaround, but Kentucky is slowly chipping away and trending in the right direction.
It was a good week for the Cats, but that doesn’t mean we should expect smooth sailing the rest of the way without any potential slip-ups. We’re looking at sustained big-picture growth, not a perfect record. You simply want to be playing your best basketball on both ends going into March.
“When you have the youngest team in the country — which is what we have — and there are times you’re playing five freshmen, you understand that there’s going to be game slippage. There just is,” John Calipari said Monday. “They’re going to revert back to some high school things, but to go down and to win against a top-10 team in a hostile environment, and you’re that young, it’s saying you’re starting to make strides.”
Playing with physicality is a mentality — nothing fundamental about that. Coming up with 50-50 balls is a want-to, not something you’ve simply got the talent to do. And there will be times when those between-the-ears things aren’t perfect these next few weeks.
That’s OK, just as long as the baby steps continue forward.
“That’s why I said we’ve got to get 10% better defensively. And if we do that, we’ll be fine. I can’t tell you that we’re not going to have some more bumps in the road,” Calipari added. “I’ll say it again: we’re the youngest team in the country. Not many teams are playing with freshmen, especially the number of freshmen we’re playing.
“So there may be some bumps in the road, but I come back to this team is built for March.”
Seeding and matchups are important, but none of it matters if your product is fool’s gold. This team had to make real defensive strides or an early exit was inevitable. They’re doing what it takes to get back in the conversation.
