By Keith Taylor
Kentucky Today
The next one will officially count.
Kentucky, which rolled to easy wins over Georgetown College and Kentucky State in a pair of exhibition games during the past two weeks, will open the season against New Mexico State on Monday night in an 8 p.m. tipoff at Rupp Arena. It will be the 15th season opener for John Calipari as coach of the Wildcats.
At least on tape, Calipari has been impressed with New Mexico State, which is in rebuilding mode under former Sam Houston State coach John Hooten. The Aggies went 9-15 last year before the season was canceled because of numerous off-the-court issues.
“New Mexico State — they are good,” Calipari said after the team’s win over Kentucky State Thursday night. “Watching tape of them … they (brought) some of their kids from Sam Houston and they make shots.”
They also play mostly a zone offense, which Calipari said will be a concern, considering his team didn’t have much time to prepare for the opener.
“If you watched us in Toronto, we were a great zone offensive team because we put Tre (Mitchell) in the middle and shooters around him,” Calipari said. “We even had high-low stuff. We’re fine. … We will have a hard game.”
Calipari said the preseason opener against Georgetown College exposed some of his team’s weaknesses and provided a roadmap toward improvement.
“The Georgetown game was a great thing for us to get bumped around and not block out, not go body-to-body,” the Kentucky coach said “That is all we have been doing, three or four things a day — go body-to-body.”
Kentucky will open the regular season without its three post players — Ugonna Onyenso, Aaron Bradshaw and Zvonomir Ivisic. Calipari said Bradshaw is close to returning to the court, while Onyenso will require more time to heal. Ivisic is awaiting clearance from the NCAA before making his collegiate debut.
“I think Aaron will probably miss the first week, maybe two, of the season,” Calipari said. “But he’s on a great path.”
While without a tall starter in the post, Calipari has relied on a smaller lineup during the team’s two exhibition games. Antonio Reeves led the Wildcats in scoring with 19 points per game, followed by Mitchell (18.5 ppg), Justin Edwards (13 ppg), Rob Dillingham (12 ppg) and Adou Thiero with an average of 11.5 points per game.
The smaller lineup allowed Kentucky to play more at random on both ends of the court.
“But this is one of those teams, like Shai (Gilgeous-Alexander) said, watching us in Toronto, every guy can pass, dribble and shoot, so it leaves you to play a little different — you know, what we are running,” he said. We were random some of the time and you have to admit, it was like wow. We were random, we had great pace (against Kentucky State).”
Kentucky’s players, including Thiero, have enjoyed the comfortable pace.
“I take that as he trusts us a lot,” Thiero said. “He knows what good basketball players do so it means a lot that he trusts us.”
Gametracker: New Mexico State at Kentucky, 8 p.m., Monday. TV/Radio: SEC Network, UK Radio Network.