Julius Randle’s consistency the only buoy for up-and-down Cats
Florida Gators forward Chris Walker (23) tries to take the ball from Kentucky Wildcats forward Julius Randle (30) at UK Basketball vs. Florida at the O’Connel Center in Gainsville, Fl., on Saturday, March 8, 2014. Photo by Emily Wuetcher
March 13, 2014
By Nick Gray | UK basketball beat writer
UK’s season has featured anything but predictability — except for the performance of freshman forward Julius Randle.
Randle has been consistent and predictable almost to a fault for a Cats offense that has sputtered from the outside since November.
He started his college career with a handful of 20-point, 10-rebound games including a 27-point, 13-rebound performance against Michigan State University in November’s State Farm Champions Classic.
The buzz around Randle grew to the point that fans and the media were predicting that he was going to have a double-double in every game this season.
UK’s opponents made sure that it was not the case. Realizing that Randle was throttling single-and-double team defenses, teams took to triple-teaming him in the high or low post. Early in the season, Randle tended to try and force a shot up against three defenders instead of passing to an open teammate.
Now, Randle has earned seven double-doubles in UK’s last eight games, the exception being against Louisiana State University, where he made the game-winning bucket in overtime.
Calipari said that his passing is good when he is willing to rely on his teammates to make plays.
“There are times they’re going to take you away, then they take you away and your teammates do the damage and we win anyway,” Calipari said in February.
Randle has fought to get good position on offense in order to help himself and be able to have room to find open teammates. Defenses have tried to trap him into corners and on the baseline, and it has forced Randle to find other ways to change the game on offense.
“It doesn’t have anything to do with me getting the ball in the right spot,” Randle said after the Arkansas loss on Feb. 27. “Defenses are going to load up on me. Regardless, there’s different ways I can affect the game.”
He has shown an outside shot that is capable of falling, and his defending has gotten better, Calipari said. Randle, a guy who was the centerpiece of his AAU and high school teams, is learning that there are other ways to use his talents for the team’s success.
“If I score or I don’t, it doesn’t really matter,” Randle said after the Cats beat Ole Miss on Feb. 18. “If I do those things (like passing and defending), I think I can put my team in a good position to win if everybody just does what Coach (Calipari) is asking them to do.”
