COLUMN: Liggins making up for lost time

It’s tough to believe that after serving a pseudo-suspension in this season’s first nine games, DeAndre Liggins is now pushing hard for a spot in the starting lineup.

But you better believe it.

Since the Austin Peay game on Dec. 19 — the first of the season in which Liggins logged significant minutes — Liggins has demonstrated his ability to make the hustle plays his teammates seem reluctant to commit to.

In one first-half sequence, Liggins made a steal, threw an outlet to Patrick Patterson and sprinted down the floor. Patterson fed him the ball and Liggins scored in the lane. On Georgia’s next possession, he took a charge.

Rupp Arena ate it up.

“Who fought? You tell me who went in and fought? DeAndre Liggins,” said UK head coach John Calipari, who hasn’t lost a regular season game since Dec. 20, 2008 when his Memphis team lost to Jonny Flynn and Syracuse. “It’s not brain surgery. We all saw how he can play. Now the question is, do I start him?”

Liggins’ emergence as a go-to hustle man may be a bit surprising. His most newsworthy moment of his freshman season was his refusal to enter a game in the middle of November, which seemed to haunt him all season.

Many thought — myself included — that with a year of experience, a new coach and improved teammates, Liggins would hop at the chance for a second chance.

Instead, he didn’t play in the season’s first nine games, for reasons neither Liggins nor Calipari will disclose. But it seems Liggins is taking full advantage of this third chance.

“I’m just trying to make the easy plays to help my team win,” he said.

The “easy plays,” as he said, don’t seem to come easy for anyone else (and they didn’t even come easy for him in a larger role last season). In 14 minutes Saturday, Liggins recorded three steals. Eric Bledsoe, playing a similar defensive role, stole three balls in 37  minutes.

Perhaps Liggins’ fearlessness toward the hustle play comes from pure necessity: If he doesn’t make those gritty plays on the floor, Calipari just won’t play him. After all, the Cats won their first nine without him.

But in close games, especially in league play, Calipari needs somebody he can turn to force a jump ball, come up with a diving save or make a crisp pass into the lane. Liggins, a highly touted recruit known in high school for his scoring ability, has turned into just that. He’ll shoot when he’s open, he said, but he recognizes he’s not on the floor to score.

“It is about battling,” Calipari said. “DeAndre was probably the difference in the game. If I had to play other people, we probably wouldn’t have enough to win.”

While Liggins had a breakout game — he said it was one of his best so far at UK — starter Darius Miller struggled, largely due to tentative play. Miller scored five points and had one steal in 15 minutes on the floor. He only took two shots from the floor, and his no-better-than-average defense didn’t make up for his lack of offensive assertiveness.

Maybe Coach Cal shouldn’t mess with what he has. His No. 3 Cats are undefeated, and Miller has started all 16 games, and has played very well at times. Liggins has started zero. But wondering minds can’t help but think about what would happen to Liggins’ production in an expanded role.

“In practice, he’s guarding John (Wall) and Eric (Bledsoe) constantly, putting pressure on them and playing tremendous defense,” Patterson said. “When he’s in, we know that DeAndre’s going to be a lockdown defender and on the offensive side, he’s going to knock down shots.”

One year ago, Liggins was riding hard on Billy Gillispie’s bad side. While in the game, he’d try too hard to make home-run passes or finish tough shots after tricky drives to the hoop.

Now Liggins, his new coach and a much different roster around him have helped transform him into everything he wasn’t last year: steady, reliable and a heck of a candidate to shake up the starting lineup.

You better believe it.

James Pennington is a journalism senior. E-mail jpennington@kykernel.com.