Kentucky basketball spent a reported $20 to $25 million this offseason on its 2025 roster — believed to be among the most expensive, if not the most expensive, in college basketball history — and 10 games into the season it feels as if the sky is falling in Lexington. So I come bearing news:
It probably is.
The 6-4 record — with losses to rival Louisville by eight points and to Gonzaga last week by 35 (!!) points — is about as rough a start as possible given preseason expectations and the lofty price tag. But it’s not just an over-extrapolation of a 10-game sample in a 31-game regular season.
Kentucky has problems it can’t fix with its in-house personnel. That’s bad enough on its own (More on that in a bit). But worse yet: Even the correctable issues like effort, focus and defensive execution, or lack thereof, are so endemic that an abrupt about-face seems unlikely.
Kentucky’s experiencing a cultural calamity.
Its 103-67 win Tuesday over North Carolina Central was as emphatic as it should have been given the level of opponent, but even its struggles within that successful outing were emblematic of systemic issues that have taken root within this team.
I reviewed the film from that game — and from every other game this season — and the receipts reveal just how far the Wildcats have to go from where they are now to reaching their ceiling. At the heart of those struggles — ironically, among them, being heart, according to former Kentucky star DeMarcus Cousins — is perhaps the most flawed multi-million dollar roster in college hoops.
“No heart”
Losing to No. 11 Gonzaga last week in Nashville by 35 points, 94-59, marked the program’s third-largest loss in the modern era and its largest by final margin since a 41-point loss at Vanderbilt on February 12, 2008, per Sports Reference.
The loss triggered a tweet by the aforementioned Cousins saying UK “has no heart” and that its showing — or rather, its no-show — was “hard to watch.” In front of a heavy contingent of fans that skewed Kentucky blue, that sentiment was shared as boos poured down at halftime. Kentucky trailed the entire game and was in a 19-2 deficit by the second media timeout.
Even the boos weren’t enough to shake Kentucky’s funk. Below is a mash-up of two clips — one from the first half, one from the second half — showing first a lackadaisical defensive contest inside the paint, and then second what would charitably be called a half-hearted effort on the glass to collect off a miss.
Both resulted in easy buckets in the paint for the Zags.
The only consistency Kentucky has shown on tape is its inconsistency. Clips like this can be pulled from every game this season.
Here’s another from the opening minutes of the Louisville game — which, for context, is one of college basketball’s most intense rivalries! – showing Kentucky big man Brandon Garrison closing out on sharpshooter Mikel Brown as if he’s a Ben Simmons-level non-threat from the 3-point line.
Garrison has undoubtedly struggled. He was effectively benched on Tuesday in Kentucky’s win after similar effort-related struggles. But he is not the only player contributing to the laugh track of lazy plays.
Pope refrained from calling out individual players postgame, but the message was clear: He wants players who will compete, and he doesn’t believe everyone is meeting that standard. That’s why former three-star wing and second-year player Trent Noah, who Pope admitted struggles in some areas and is “not a perfect player,” was given his second career start vs. NC Central.
“He’s all in,” Pope said. “He’s fully invested, and he’s going to give everything he’s got all the time on the floor.”
Pope also added that his entire team has “a lot of growing to do.”
“We don’t really know what it means to compete yet,” Pope said, adding: “Which is terrifying.”
What some would call terrifying, others would label as inexplicable. Kentucky’s identity is one of apathy.
Personnel problems
Most coaches would argue and believe effort and hustle are correctable and can be coached to improve. This makes sense. However, the effort and energy being expended to coach those correctable fixes at some point produces diminishing returns. Kentucky is close to that point.
Pope and his staff starting Noah and benching Garrison on Tuesday are examples of ways to hold players accountable. That’s a start. But Kentucky’s issues go beyond this.
Among 16 SEC teams, Kentucky is 11th in 3-point shooting percentage, and its adjusted offensive efficiency rating at KenPom — though respectable at No. 31 nationally — is eighth among SEC teams, just below Texas and just ahead of Missouri. And its 83.6 points per game is 87th-highest in college basketball. Even with four of its 10 games coming against top-20 opponents, it’s hard to conclude that it’s anything other than a disappointment for the hefty price tag of fielding this roster.
Take the below via CBB Analytics data as further evidence of its roster construction problems. The only areas on the floor that Kentucky is shooting above the Division I average are at the rim and in the corners. On midrange 2s, it is shooting 11.9% below the Division I average; on above-the-break 3s, it is shooting 2.1% below the Division I average; and on shots in the paint that aren’t at the rim, it is shooting 9.5% below the Division I average.
This is a shot chart where you don’t want to see much, if any, blue areas. And it’s a shot chart that is overwhelmingly deep blue.
There are two ways I’d propose papering over this. The first would be by becoming an elite defensive playmaking team to capitalize on its terrific transition offense and turning up the tempo. The second would be by smashing the offensive glass and generating second-chance points. Neither seem like viable solutions because of personnel.
Kentucky’s turnover rate defensively is 268th among 365 teams at the Division I level. As examples, Florida and Alabama, who are legitimate SEC contenders, are worse off in this department, so on paper this seems an obstacle that can be overcome. But Florida helps offset its lack of defensive playmaking and early struggles from 3-point range with a top-two mark in offensive rebounding rate and a borderline top-10 defensive unit. Alabama on the other hand leans on its top-three offense, top-10 pace and top-10 3-point rate to erase its own dearth of defensive playmaking.
Kentucky has not shown signs of being capable of drastically changing its habits and production in ways that would meaningfully make enough of a difference in either of those areas.
Sophomore center Jayden Quaintance, who has not played yet this season, and junior forward Mouhamed Dioubate, who has missed nearly a month with an injury, project as net-positives on defense after strong seasons last year at Arizona State and Alabama, respectively. However, neither can be expected to be saviors for this sinking season.
An inflection point
Publicly preaching patience and playing the long game has been Pope’s modus operandi so far, even as the season has teetered on the brink. But Tuesday night seemed to be an inflection point for both coach and team.
At halftime, Pope assessed his team was having defensive breakdowns that were “unacceptable,” and he appeared visibly disgusted as if he’d just choked down a mayonnaise and tuna sandwich.
“We’re really frustrated about that,” he said. “We’ve gotta guard.”
Frustrations boiled over for Pope during Tuesday’s game, and he broke a clipboard during a timeout, Wildcats guard Otega Oweh said after the game. Oweh said he’d never seen Pope that mad in his two years in Lexington. But …
“It was justified,” Oweh added. “As players, we gotta be sick and tired of the same thing [happening] over and over again. It’s what was right in the moment.”
Maybe some pride and an attitude adjustment from coach on down the program can help right the ship. That’d be a start. But tweaks in demeanor ultimately may serve as a band-aid for destructive defensive habits and dismal roster construction.
It’s clear Pope isn’t giving up yet, even as reasons to do so mount. He is adamant that the competitive juices have flowed behind the scenes, but inexplicably not translated to game settings. But it’s equally clear that a Kentucky team that was top-10 in the preseason is nowhere close to playing up to that level and is grasping for straws to find answers that may not come this season.
“We have a standard we have to live up to,” Pope said Tuesday. “We’re not, and we have to. So we’ll keep fighting until we do.”
