If you sat through the 2.5-hour slugfest in which Kentucky lost to Georgia 82-69, chances are good that you complained about the officiating at least a few times. We try not to do that too much here at KentuckySportsRadio.com these days, but even the most patient fan had to be at his wits’ end tonight.

There were 45 fouls called, with Georgia going to the line twice as often as Kentucky. The Bulldogs were 29-38 from the charity stripe to Kentucky’s 15-19 mark. The officials went to the monitor nine times to check the conversations, which made it almost impossible to achieve a flow of the game, especially in the second half. Mark Pope was asked about the free throw disparity after the game and refused to use it as an excuse for his team’s performance.

“Look, this has nothing to do with this game. We leave all the stuff behind. We are working on the next piece. We will control the things we can control, and we can control enough factors in this game to win the game. That will always be true, so let’s not let that distract us.”

That’s exactly the kind of reaction you’d expect from Pope, who attended a refereeing symposium several years ago to better understand the profession. Graduate forward Andrew Carrone of four Wildcats with four fouls tonight, didn’t blame management for the loss, but admitted the constant disruption took some of the Cats’ energy away.

“I felt at times tonight that we – you know, coach talks about energy all the time, but our energy was sapped by fouls and things like that, some things that we can’t necessarily control affected our efforts.” Carr said in his postgame conversation with Goose Givens.

Kentucky’s frontcourt was particularly hit by foul trouble, with Amari Williams picking up his fourth foul just three minutes into the second half and Carr picking up his fourth foul with 11:22 left. Carr believes the Cats’ frustration with defense has led to some fouls, something they will have to eliminate as SEC play continues.

“I just think a lot of them came from offensive rebounds, and that’s how they got to the finish line a little bit. And then also just, you know, I think straight lines do a better job with defending on the ball to be able to move your feet and In my opinion we wiped the ball downfield too often as a last-ditch effort.

“And as a referee, any downward movement of the arm is a foul, especially when we are on the move. So I think we need to be a lot more disciplined in terms of trusting our verticality and what we’ve talked about all year, all summer, and being able to do a better job of trying to move forward without fouling.”

They get another opportunity Saturday at No. 14 Mississippi State.

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