Kentucky could not get stops against Missouri late and lost for the 11th time. (SEC Photo)
Between the comments about Terrence Clarke and Dontaie Allen after Wednesday’s loss at Missouri, it was easy to overlook one very telling comment Kentucky coach John Calipari made. Again, Kentucky had a chance to win before losing 75-70 but the Cats became unglued the final four minutes again to lose with a series of offensive and defensive miscues.
“What we have right now, I think they all want to win but I still think they want to win on their terms,” Calipari said.
Wow. It’s February, Kentucky has played 16 games with a 5-11 record, and players still “want to win on their terms” and not play team basketball.
That’s a problem. A big problem. Maybe Calipari didn’t mean it exactly the way it sounded because on his radio show Thursday night he again emphasized he thought the team was closer to putting winning plays together.
“My hope is before we run out of runway that we start to click and rely on each other rather than trying to get mine,” the UK coach said.
“We are starting to come together and get closer but we have got to finish out and figure who can finish, you can’t foul, you rebound like crazy, and we are not going to turn it over.”
The plan sounds good. It just never seems to work in close call after close call that all turn into losses. Senior guard Davion Mintz admits that is “extremely tough” on the players.
“There’s been a common denominator of every game, so I feel like when we find the answer to it, we’ll feel a lot better. The thing is we’re working on it and we’re strategizing,” Mintz said after Wednesday’s loss.
“We just had our first practice, I think, the day before yesterday, where Coach brought us in and said, ‘OK, here’s the problem. We have to win the last four minutes.’ And we’re trying to come up with schemes. It’s tough but we have to figure it out.”
