Mark Pope's team needs to find a new way to win games

NEW YORK – We’ve seen how well Kentucky basketball plays and how high it can rise when it runs fast and goes full throttle. They led the NCAA in scoring with an average of 91.3 points per game and earned 10 wins in non-conference games.

These quick displays aren’t the type of plays the Wildcats will always have in SEC play, and especially not when the postseason is upon us and every possession counts in the NCAA Tournament.

Great Britain just learned what it’s like when the threes aren’t falling and the shots aren’t as plentiful in the 85-65 loss to Ohio State in the CBS Sports Classic at Madison Square Garden.

“We have to find other ways when the ball isn’t going in,” said UK guard Otega Oweh, who scored a team-high 21 points. “I feel like we could have released some energy on defense, maybe scored a few easy baskets and caused turnovers, but unfortunately we weren’t able to do that.”

The Cats need alternative ways to win games other than putting enormous pressure on their opponents by scoring quickly and easily. To put it simply: you have to learn how to win an ugly game with little possession.

Ohio State was embarrassed by Auburn 91-53 in Atlanta just a week ago. But the Buckeyes took a much more deliberate approach to facing the Cats. Head coach Jake Diebler deliberately slowed down the pace at times to lure Great Britain off the offensive.

Kentucky had just 67 possessions against Ohio State and scored just 0.970 points per possession, well below its season average of 1.222 points per possession entering the game.

“We tried to shorten the game a little bit with some of our offensive possessions and felt like we had to defend them in the half court longer in those moments,” Diebler said. “It’s a respect for what they’ve accomplished.”

Kentucky will feel a lot more respected this season.

This won’t be the last time an opponent who may be less talented resorts to taking possession out of the game to limit the Cats.

Many teams don’t have anyone like Ohio State’s Bruce Thornton to take the shots. UK coach Mark Pope highlighted that Thornton, who dropped a game-high 30 points, had taken advantage of the Cats’ defense after it reduced a 15-point deficit to six in the second half.

Pope said Thornton exploited a “schematic problem” that he needed to fix. Pope had pushed the UK greats to the top of the screen, but when Thornton rejected his screener, the lane was wide open for drives.

“We tried a number of different program changes and in the end Thornton was too good for us,” Pope said. “…Everything we tried, it seemed like he had a pretty good answer for us.”

The game was somewhat similar to the Cats’ only other loss this season.

Kentucky also failed to break the 70-point mark in its 70-66 setback at Clemson in its first true road game of the season.

The Tigers played more physical than any other opponent in the UK, and the Buckeyes copied some of that tough play.

“We just knew pressure on the ball was going to be a key factor,” Thornton said.

This led to the Cats hitting a couple of season lows: They shot 29.8% from the field and made just four 3-pointers en route to shooting 18% from behind the arc. The previous low field goal percentage was 38.1% against Clemson, and seven three-pointers were made against Clemson, Gonzaga and Georgia State.

These percentages alone did not result in a loss.

UK attacked the basket so often that it got to the free throw line 32 times, second only to 42 attempts against Western Kentucky this season.

But the Cats allowed Ohio State to shoot 57% from the floor. It was the first time this season that Great Britain allowed a team to shoot more than 50%.

These are the neutral site games that will determine how quickly the season ends in March. British fans turning Madison Square Garden into Rupp Arena Northeast and many Buckeyes fans presumably watching their football team in the playoffs couldn’t even help the cause.

“We just could never find the pace of the game,” Pope said.

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