Kentucky needed to win a basketball game after losing three in a row. The Wildcats won a basketball game. That is all that matters.
It wasn’t the most aesthetically pleasing thing in the world, but beggars can’t be choosers in true SEC road battles as conference play comes to a close, right? That’s what we’ll tell ourselves, at least, as UK walked into a building where it had won just once since 2018 and left victorious.
The final score doesn’t necessarily reflect how close things felt for much of the night — and certainly not the 12-point lead it had with 36 seconds to go — considering it was down to two with just two-and-a-half minutes left on the clock. 12 points, nine points or two points, though, at the end of the day, it was enough to move to 18-10 on the year and 9-6 in the SEC, the Wildcats positioned once again for a bye in the SEC Tournament — or even a double-bye with some luck.
KSR has the takeaways from the win in Columbia.
Denzel Aberdeen creates the early separation
Down by as many as seven in the first five minutes, Kentucky chipped away to cut it to two at the 9:34 mark, followed by back-to-back-to-back 3-pointers from Denzel Aberdeen to turn that deficit into a seven-point lead with 6:39 to go in the first half — a 14-point swing in nine minutes.
He added another early in the second half to put the Wildcats back up four, then got a second-chance jumper to fall to push it to four at the 6:06 mark, followed by three more free throws late to extend it to nine, then 11. That would bring his total to a game-high 19 points on 6-12 shooting and 4-6 from three to go with five assists, four rebounds and zero turnovers in 37 minutes.
It was just short of a perfect Aberdeen game, and Mark Pope said as much at the podium.
“We kind of felt as a staff that D.A. was due; he was just due for a game. He’s just been a little quieter, and he actually bailed us out. He was terrific with shot-making. He was really, really solid defensively for the whole night. He had a terrific game.”
As KSR’s Brandon Ramsey pointed out after the game, Aberdeen has only turned the ball over three times compared to 16 assists in Kentucky’s last four games — despite racking up 56 total turnovers as a team in that span. He’s playing at an unbelievably high level right now and deserves a ton of credit, given the circumstances of his unexpected role as PG1 going into the season.
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Mo Dioubate finishes the job late
He’s like a tush push in football — boring and polarizing, but effective and a pain in the rear end to stop. Dioubate got off to a slow start with just two points and an assist in the first half, but then took things over in the second to lead the way with 10 points on 4-8 shooting and 2-3 at the line with four rebounds, one block and one steal after the break.
With the game tied at 41-41 with 11:57 left in the game, he went on his own 5-0 run in 30 seconds with an and-one leading to a steal-and-score in transition. Then he earned a second-chance opportunity for a teammate, got to the line and knocked down a free throw, finished a layup and another dunk to push it to double figures.
It was a little bit of this and a little bit of that as the perfect complementary closing piece to Aberdeen and his red-hot start.
“I just try to do my job. Everyone knows me at this point, being a hard-playing, blue-collar guy,” Dioubate said after the win. “When I get in the game, I just try to do my job, try to bring the energy, try to get as many steals, as many rebounds or blocks as I can to help my team.”
The win was decided on the glass
South Carolina entered the day ranked No. 230 on the defensive glass, No. 301 in rebounding average, No. 318 in rebounding margin and No. 325 on the offensive glass. The Gamecocks’ leading rebounder is a 6-9 guard at 5.4 per contest with no one else above 4.0 per game — and that guy was out.
Kentucky knew going in that there was an obvious opening there to attack, and that’s exactly what the Wildcats did. In fact, I’m not sure things could have gone any better in that area, absolutely dominating that battle 48-28 with an 18-5 advantage on the offensive boards. That led to 14 second-chance points compared to just four for USC.
Seems pretty important in a nine-point win, wouldn’t you say?
“One of the things they’ve struggled with is the glass, and our guys did a nice job doing the best they could to take advantage of it,” Pope said afterward. “It probably was the difference in the game.”
Don’t forget about Captain Clutch!
He was on a different planet, and then came back to earth in a disappointing road effort at Auburn, scoring 10 points on 3-8 shooting and 1-6 from three with five turnovers. Chandler’s response? A return to form as Captain Clutch.
The sophomore guard finished with 10 points on 4-6 shooting and 2-4 from three with three assists and two rebounds, but no sequence was more important than his response to South Carolina cutting the lead to just two points with 2:52 left in the game. First, he found Malachi Moreno for an assisted layup to push it to four, then found himself five feet beyond the 3-point line on the next offensive possession, lifting for a jumper at the end of the shot clock with 1:51 remaining.
The result was the dagger you knew he’d throw, giving Kentucky a seven-point lead to effectively end the game.
Then he added another breakaway dunk with nine seconds to go to push it to 10, just to put the icing on the cake.
Right back where he belongs as a difference-maker in wins for the good guys.
Otega Oweh was a major disappointment
The Preseason SEC Player of the Year had been as dominant as anyone in league play up to this point with very few slip-ups. Oweh’s run of 11 20-point performances in 14 total SEC games brought his UK total to 19, tying him with Antonio Reeves for most as a Wildcat since 1996-97. He was also the first Kentucky player since Malik Monk to score in double figures in 30 straight games, dating back to last season.
The latter streak would come to a close and the former will have to wait until at least this weekend, as Oweh finished with just eight points on 3-13 shooting and 0-2 from three. He’d add five steals, four rebounds and three assists, but his all-around play simply wasn’t good enough for what this program needs entering postseason play. He turned it over three times, settled for bad shots — typically long, contested mid-range jumpers — and was credited with four missed layups and a missed dunk. His energy was all over the place and he often felt disconnected from the action, like someone playing pick-up at the park more than the face of an SEC program trying to lead his team to a victory on the road.
Oweh has earned the right to have a bad game, obviously, but would he want to be excused for this? Pope has talked pretty openly about wanting more out of his star guard over the last week — despite back-to-back career-high scoring outputs in losses — and said No. 00 feels the same way. If that’s the standard, it’s fair to say he regressed in Columbia and will need to make up for it in the Vanderbilt rematch this weekend.
South Carolina is a bad basketball team
The eye test matched the analytics, which told us the Gamecocks (No. 105 in the NET) were the worst team on the Wildcats’ schedule since Bellarmine (No. 289) on December 23. They’re not too far off from Valparaiso (No. 150), which was a 48-point win in the second game of the season.
The numbers told us they were Meechie Johnson and a bunch of role players, and there weren’t many surprises. Their sixth-year star had an inefficient 18 while Mike Sharavjamts shined with 12 on 4-6 shooting and Elijah Strong got to 11 on 15 shots. Just not a lot there for Lamont Paris in year four at USC, and it didn’t help that longtime starter Myles Stute was ruled out on Monday, even considering his recent scoring struggles.
It’s why Kentucky fans weren’t rushing to State Street to burn couches after this one. The win was fine, but considering the Wildcats’ recent slump and the Gamecocks’ obvious struggles, this could have been a beatdown with loud Go Big Blue chants filling up Colonial Life Arena from start to finish. There were opportunities to take the lead and run with it, but they couldn’t take advantage.
The good news? Style points don’t matter this late in the season. UK had a job to do and the job was done. Clock in, clock out.