By Keith Taylor
Kentucky Today
Kentucky defeated a former coach for the second time this season, picking up a badly needed victory on the road.
Coming off an embarrassing 80-55 loss at Vanderbilt, Kentucky handed former coach John Calipari and No. 15 Arkansas an 85-77 loss, ending the Razorbacks’ three-game winning streak and a 16-game home win streak. The Wildcats defeated Rick Pitino and St. John’s 78-66 on Dec. 20 in the CBS Sports Classic and improved to 15-5 overall in games played against former coaches.
Wildcats coach Mark Pope said his team’s response to a restart in practice this week led to the impressive victory.
“The last couple days, we asked them to approach practice a little differently, and every team’s different,” said Pope, who improved to 9-1 in bounce-back games at Kentucky. “I’ve never had a team that needed some of the things that this team needs, and I’ve never had a team that maybe can do some of the things that this team has.
“We were trying things that we’ve actually never done before, and I thought our guys responded. They really tried to get a few minutes in each practice. There’s a good chance that helped us feel right earlier in this game. We’ll see what kind of staying power it has. I was really proud of the guys for giving a great effort the last several days to try to address some of our issues.”
Kentucky (15-7, 6-3 Southeastern Conference) overcame four technical fouls, including three in a span of 38 seconds in the second half, that led to an 11-2 Arkansas run and produced a 57-53 lead for the hosts with 12 minutes remaining.
The score was deadlocked at 63 when a technical foul on Arkansas opened the door for Kentucky to recover and regain the lead.
An Arkansas technical on Malique Ewin, who was reprimanded for tossing the ball at the face of Mouhamed Dioubate after Dioubate was fouled attempting the layup. That led four free throws and a 7-0 run that gave the Wildcats an eventual 70-63 lead with seven minutes remaining.
Arkansas coach John Calipari said that stretch was crucial.
“It’s a tie game, we get an intentional or a technical foul, and all of a sudden they get four (points) and the ball,” Calipari said. “I mean, wait a minute, it was a tie game.”
Ewin’s technical was one of seven combined technical and flagrant fouls called in the game.
A basket by Collin Chandler as the shot clock expired with 1:14 left gave the Wildcats an eight-point advantage and the spacing needed to hold off the Hogs.
Otega Oweh led the Wildcats with 24 points and missed just three shots in 12 attempts from the floor. Oweh added eight rebounds and three assists, Chandler added 13 points, followed by Malachi Moreno with 11 points and two clutch blocked shots. Denzel Aberdeen rounded out four players in double figures with 10 points. Moreno was scoreless in the opening half but tallied his final tally during the second half.
Oweh said the win was “definitely personal” after the Razorbacks dealt the Wildcats an 89-79 setback last season at Rupp Arena. Oweh was also happy the Wildcats rebounded from the loss at Vanderbilt.
“We were just eager to get back out there, and it just so happened that we were playing Arkansas and the former coach of Kentucky, but it was definitely personal for us just to come out here and clean it up and set the tone,” Oweh said on the SEC Network.
Trent Noah just missed double figures with nine points and seven rebounds off the bench. Noah sank a clutch 3-pointer in the first half and hit some big free throws down the stretch.
“It was a beautiful team win — It’s always good to get one on the road and in an environment like this,” Noah said on the postgame radio show. ”It just kind of showed how resilient our group is, and I’m super, super happy to go to war with them every single night.”
Unlike the team’s performance in Nashville earlier this week, the Wildcats had just seven turnovers and outrebounded Arkansas 35-26. They also limited the Razorbacks to just two points in transition. Kentucky had six blocked shots, including three by Dioubate.
Kentucky, which has struggled in the first half and made just one field goal in its first 12 field goal attempts against the Commodores, connected on 11 of its first 13 shots and led 26-13 eight minutes into the contest.
Darius Acuff led Arkansas (16-6, 6-3) with 22 points. Trevon Brazile had 16 points, followed by Billy Richmond with 14, Ewin with 11 and Meleek Thomas with 10.
Gametracker: Oklahoma at Kentucky, 9 p.m., Wednesday. TV/Radio: ESPN2, UK Radio Network.
