Cats mired in recent shooting slump
December 12, 2014
By Kyle Arensdorf
The game between UK basketball and North Carolina three seasons ago has gone down in UK lore.
Anthony Davis blocked the shot of UNC’s John Henson to stay undefeated on the season and from that moment, the Cats rode the momentum to a National Championship.
The No. 21 Tar Heels (6-2) come to Lexington on Saturday, primed to take the series lead from UK for the first time in the Calipari era.
UNC will be the Cats’ 11th opponent this season, a position that was favorable for them a season ago.
Playing in front of their home crowd, the Tar Heels downed the Cats 82-77.
But this is a drasticaly different UK team.
The Cats enter Saturday undefeated after victories against two Top-10 opponents with both wins by an average of 22 points.
Despite the unblemished record, UK has looked sloppy in its last four games and has been extremely cold from 3-point range.
In those matchups, the Cats are just 8-for-49 from beyond the 3-point arc, a miniscule 16 percent.
“The crazy thing is, we have good shooters,” UK head coach John Calipari said after UK’s 56-46 victory over Columbia Wednesday. “We’re a good shooting team that’s not making shots.”
“We’re shooting just as bad in the practice facility, maybe we should go to the blue courts outside and try it out there in wind,” added Calipari.
One of the culprits of the slump is freshman guard Devin Booker, who, along with freshman guard Tyler Ulis, did not play against Columbia Wednesday.
After the game, Calipari said he didn’t know the health situation of the two players, who were held out Wednesday due to “minor injuries,” but said if they did not practice Thursday they would not play Saturday.
In UNC’s last five games, the Tar Heels have knocked off two ranked opponents (No. 22 UCLA and No. 18 Florida), but have been defeated by two unranked teams as well (Butler and Iowa).
The Tar Heels are led by junior guard Marcus Paige, who leads the team in scoring and has made more threes (18) than the rest of his team combined (17).
UNC is just the first in a huge three-game string for the Cats, as they take on previously ranked UCLA in Chicago on Dec. 20, then No. 4 Louisville on Dec. 27.
