In case you have managed to avoid the news leading up to today's matchup and not checked another site which has a similar name, today has been deemed "Jort's Day". Tonight is senior night at Rupp and therefore UK will be honoring our lone senior: Josh Harrellson. Harrellson came here as a JUCO transfer player during the dark years of UK under Gillispie. If I am remembering correctly, his coach prior to the transfer praised Harrellson and talked about how much he thought the combination of Patterson and Harrellson could accomplish on the front lines. Well thanks in large part to our coach at the time, Harrellson spent much of his initial time here on the bench or locked in a bathroom stall during halftime (during a Vandy game) and we never really got to see this dream combination play out.
When Calipari came along there was a chance Jorts might be cut but Cal kept him and thanks to a little motivation from Cal after a Twitter incident, he has become a fan favorite and a player making a huge impact on a Kanter-less team. The Jorts nickname came from a photo of Harrellson wearing jean shorts which when combined makes "Jorts" and is a name Harrellson has actually grown to embrace. I've always been one that loved getting to see the less recognized players making big contributions and have really enjoyed watching Harrellson have such a good year. In his first two years here he spent a lot of time on the bench and was clearly UK's biggest cheerleader on the sidelines so I'm glad he is now getting his time to shine and show what he can do. Congratulations Jorts, we here at KSO wish you all the best tonight and beyond!
Now, onto tonight's game...
After beating the best team in the SEC East and entire SEC for that matter this season, we now have to face the second best SEC East team (SEC record-wise) which is the Vanderbilt Commodores. We last played them back on Feb 12 in what ended up being a 81-77 win for Vandy. While many road losses this season were due to various mistakes, I blame that 4 point loss on Vandy's crazy court. Anyway, now we have them at Rupp where Cal is unbeaten. It will be a hard game for sure but if the Cats can come out with the same focus as they did against Florida and we have contributions from the upperclassmen again as we did with Miller in the last game (which I'm really hoping comes from Jorts in a big way tonight to finish off his last game at Rupp) then we should be able to come away with another home win and make it two unbeaten years at home for Cal.
A few major stats for the teams play out as follows:
.......................................UK ................Vandy
Points Per Game .........20th ...............24th
Rebounds Per Game ..26th ...............49th
Assists Per Game .......172nd ............130th
Field Goal Pct ..............49th ...............73rd
Other Numbers:
Overall Record ...........20-8 ...............21-7
SEC Record................8-6 ..................9-5
Home Record .............14-0 ...............14-2
Away Record ..............3-7 ..................5-4
Vs Top 25 ...................4-2 ..................3-2
Of the big overall national stats, UK has Vandy beat in PPG, RPG, and FGPct with Vandy only winning on APG. The records for both teams is really close and earlier Scott did a good job of showing the various scenarios for what this game could and does mean moving forward in terms of UK going into the SEC tournament. Best case scenario is we beat Vandy tonight and UT at home then Vandy lose to Florida as well and Georgia drop a game so that there isn't even a tie-breaker necessary and we cleanly lock up the second place SEC tournament bye. Winning tonight's game is essential for us having the best shot at winning that bye which is extremely important for this years UK team with a short bench since it would give us the first day of the SEC tournament off which means one less game to play and would have them less worn out if they make the championship game.
This year's team has not met the expectations many of us had for it based on how spoiled last years #1 class had us. The road play has been bad but the play against Florida on Saturday shows us this team does have the ability to play well and beat good teams as long as the don't get raddled. Hopefully Saturday's win helped this team out mentally and gave them confidence moving forward. Winning tonight's game would go a long way in redeeming a season many started giving up on.
Catch the game @ 9:00 on ESPN for TV watchers or 98.1 The Bull FM for those listening on local radio.
GO CATS!!!!
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