By: Stocktony
A few quick thoughts…
Everyone with the University of Kentucky basketball team has a learning curve this year. Obviously the most of the players had never experienced college hoops, literally. They’ve never known, until tonight, what it means to step foot into a college game. They don’t understand the rigors of a forty-minute game, a full thirty-plus-game season. The competition level of playing against junior and senior scholarship athletes.
But it’s not just the players. Cal and the other coaches also have adjustments to make. Each year is a gauntlet of challenges for those coaches. Each year a fresh set a freshman forces the staff to become not only better coaches but also to amend their prior skill set. Every team—especially an ostensibly new team each year—possesses different strengths and weaknesses. This is and always has been Cal’s mantra, and I trust that he knows what he is talking about. He’s proven it year in and year out.
For instance, Cal began the second half of the game tonight with a zone. Perhaps the hardest thing for young players learn is playing defense on the college level. College defensive schemes can be complex with help-side switches and other nuances that most high school athletes (especially those who have been athletically superior stars) have never known. Zone allowed Kentucky freshman to fall back into more familiar pattern and buoy their confidence which led to better offensive possessions, including some transition baskets, and a lead.
And still, with all this learning to be done, perhaps the greatest lesson must be absorbed by we the fans. Each year the Cats bring in a super-talented group of freshman. This year is no different, however, there is not one sophomore, say similar to an Isaiah Briscoe, who has extensive experience to help right the ship when the Big Blue seas roil.
We as a Big Blue Nation must exercise our steepest, strongest patience with this team. The ups and downs will be drastic, but the rewards could be extraordinary. But we must understand that March is the destination, and November-February allows plenty of time for growth.
It won’t be perfection, but if you put your trust in Cal and the process he has demonstrated these past nine years, you can rest easy. This young and raw team won’t recognize itself in March, and neither will we.