Entries Tagged 'Game stories' ↓

With Jodie Meeks scoring 32 points, the Blue team beat the White team 86-81 Saturday night in Kentucky’s annual pre-season basketball scrimmage.

Meeks showed he’s completely recovered from off-season surgery to repair a sports hernia. He drove with authority and hit five of 11 three-point shots.

Patrick Patterson added 17 points for the Blues, who appeared to be the starters, at least at this early juncture. Other Blue team starters were Michael Porter, who Coach Billy Gillispie had said led the point guard competition and Perry Stevenson. The fifth starter was freshman Darius Miller.

Only Stevenson failed to score double figures. Miller and Porter scored 10 points eachy. Jared Carter came off the bench and had 11 points.

Transfer Josh Harrellson led the White team with 16 points. He also grabbed 10 rebounds.

A.J. Stewart had 15 points, Matt Pilgrim 13, Mark Krebs 12 and DeAndre Liggins 10.  Liggins, who did not enter the game until eight minutes had been played, also was credited with nine assists.

What did it all mean? Well, Gillispie reclined in a seat, his left hang hanging over his right knee, much of the night. Also telling was Patterson not playing down the stretch.

The Blue team, which was made up of likely starters, led the White team 39-37 at halftime.

Jodie Meeks and Patrick Patterson, the team leaders this season, led the way. The two combined for 27 points. Meeks poured in 18, including three-of-six shooting from three-point range, to make clear that he’s fully recovered from off-season surgery to repair a sports hernia.

Patterson added nine points, but did look a bit rusty. He only grabbed one rebound.

Transfer Josh Harrellson led the White team with nine points. A.J. Stewart had eight points.

A few impressions from the first half:

– Freshman DeAndre Liggins has a way to go to become UK’s point guard of the present. He’s been considered the point guard of the future since committing to the Cats.

Liggins did not enter the game until the 11:58 mark. Aside from banking in a shot from the left corner, he didn’t stand out.

The other point guard candidates, junior Michael Porter and transfer Kevin Galloway, did not excel. Porter went scoreless, including a missed fast-break layup that fooled public address announcer Carl Nathe, who mistakenly told the  crowd of the basket scored.

Mid-way through the half, UK Coach Billy Gillispie, who mostly observed, called time to chastise Porter for throwing away a pass after he sprawled to the floor to retrieve a loose ball.

Galloway made only one shot and had three turnovers, including one in the final minute.

Gillispie has made a point of wondering about UK’s execution at crunch time now that Joe Crawford and Ramel Bradley have run out of eligibility. Neither team scored in the final minute with each committing a turnover.

Through the first eight minutes of Kentucky’s Blue-White scrimmage, fans saw plenty of Jodie Meeks and nothing of freshman DeAndre Liggins.

Meeks led the Blue team to an 18-15 lead. He scored 10 points to that span. That included one of only two three-point shots made by the Cats (two of seven overall).

Liggins, the presumed point guard of the future, did not play until coming into the game after the television timeout at the 11:58 mark.

Liggins immediately made his presence known by banking — yes, banking — a shot from the let corner.

With less than 10 minutes to go before tip-off, it’s safe to say fans are not flocking to see Kentucky’s Blue-White scrimmage in Rupp Arena.

And organizers apparently anticipated a much smaller crowd than, say, attended Big Blue Madness. Black curtains were drawn to block off the upper arena seating in both end zones and the sideline opposite the bench.

Officials could have curtained off the entire upper arena. At this point, only 10 people (not counting ushers) are in the upper arena on the bench side.

There are empty seats in the lower arena, but not a great deal of them. I’d estimate the crowd at about 8,000.

The Blue-White scrimmage has never drawn as many fans or generated the excitement of Big Blue Madness. That’s curious given that the scrimmage offers more of a preview of UK’s team. Madness is pure show business, a reason famed broadcaster Cawood Ledford took pride in never having attended Madness.

Anyway, it’s on with the show in about six minutes.

We’ll be blogging when warranted to update you on how things are proceeding.

Kentucky scored the game’s first eight points and steadily pulled away to a 31-14 halftime lead.
Stingy defense discombobulated Ole Miss from tipoff to halftime. The Cats led by as much as 31-8 before Ole Miss scored the final six points of the half.
Coming off a 26.8-percent shooting performance at LSU last weekend, Ole Miss actually slumped further in the opening 20 minutes. The Rebels made only six of 25 shots (24 percent) and missed all 10 of their threep-0point shots.
Warren, the team’s leading scorer (15.2 ppg), led the way, so to speak, by making only one of eight shots (zero for five from three-point range).
Two three-point misses by Warren helped Kentucky get off to fast start.
Ramon Harris’s three-pointer (his second since the Louisville game on Jan. 5) gave UK an 8-0 lead. That prompted an Ole Miss timeout with 18:10 left.
The Rebels went inside to Dwayne Curtis, their center and the player that put the strength in Ole Miss’s supposed inside strength. He got fouled on his low-post attempt.
But then Ole Miss went back to firing away from the perimeter. The Rebels did not attempt another two-pointer until the 15:28 mark. David Huertas, a transfer from Florida, missed a fast-break layup. Jermey Parnell nearly fumbled away the rebound before Huertas grabbed the loose ball and laid it home. That marked the Rebels’ first basket.
Ole Miss had only four points until Warren hit a pull-up in the lane with 5:43 left. That marked the Rebels’ first points in exactly seven minutes.
Kentucky made 12 of 22 shots. Except for Harris’s three-pointer, the big three (Patterson, Bradley and Crawford) scored all of UK’s points in the first 11 minutes.
Then Stevenson, who dreamed about a 200-point game on Tuesday, scored seven straight points to break the monotony.

At the third television timeout, Kentucky led Ole Miss 20-4 Wednesday night.

UK limted to Rebels to 2-for-16 shooting (zero of eight from three-pointer range) to that point.

Ramon Harris contributed his second three-pointer since the Louisville game on Jan. 5.

Other oddities included Donna Smith’s presence behind the Ole Miss bench. Her youngest son, Brian, made his first start of the season.

While Kentucky will play without Derrick Jasper and Jodie Meeks, Mississippi State will have at least one of its injured players in the starting lineup. State listed forward Charles Rhodes, nursing a sprained ankle, in its starting lineup.

Rhodes, who played only 12 minutes in tshe last four games while hobbled by the sprained ankle, averages 15 points and seven rebounds.

Meanwhile, Kentucky listed the same starters that began the Vanderbilt game: center Patrick Patterson, forwards Mark Coury and Ramon Harris and guards Ramel Bradley and Joe Crawford.

As Kentucky warms up, Derrick Jasper sits on the bench watching. Jodie Meeks stands on the sideline watching.

So it appears Kentucky will be shorthanded at Mississippi State Tuesday night.

The students are throwing barbs at UK players. Stuff like “Look out, it’s Gardner-Webb!? and “Where’s Tubby?” UK players smile and continue shooting.

Here’s my take on what’s to come:

Should be interesting. Miss State is much more athletic than Vandy. I get the feeling Kentucky will have more problems with athleticism (a la Houston). But we’ll see.
State has the nation’s best shot blocker (Jarvis Varnado, averaging more than 5 blocks a game). Guard Jamont Gordon is all-around threat.
If Varnado gets in foul trouble — and Gordon turns the ball over — Kentucky could be in business.

UK led Vandy 13-10 at the second television timeout.

Inside players Patrick Patterson and Mark Coury led the way. They accounted for 11 of the 13 points.

The good start rated two standing ovations from the Rupp Arena crowd.

Meanwhile, Vandy big man A.J. Ogilvy had only two points, a basket allowed on a UK goaltending.

Kentucky jumped to a 6-4 lead by the time of the first television timeout Saturday.

The Cats scored the first  six points of the game. When Joe Crawford passed to Mark Coury for a layup, it put UK ahead 6-0 and brought a rousing standing ovation.

UK started its 12th lineup in 14 games. Crawford, who UK Coach Billy Gillispie noted on  Friday had been improving, started for the first time since the Houston game.