COLUMBIA, Mis. — No. 19 Kentucky men’s basketball conquers No. 15 Missouri 91-83 inside Mizzou Arena on Saturday afternoon, wrapping up the regular season with another top 25 victory.
The result saw Head Coach Mark Pope end his first ever season at the helm of the Wildcats with a 21-10 record heading into postseason basketball.
Kentucky entered the contest on the back of an absolute thrashing of SEC bottom-feeder LSU, winning 95-64 in the final game of the year inside Rupp Arena for the Cats.
Looking to finish the regular season strong and increase the shine of its seeding in the SEC Tournament, Kentucky brought out a starting five of Otega Oweh, Lamont Butler, Koby Brea, Andrew Carr and Amari Williams.
Things would get off to an atrocious start offensively for both teams as, by the time the first timeout rolled around with almost five minutes played, UK fans had already seen Collin Chandler and Brandon Garrison and just 10 combined points had been scored.
Soon, the rest of the posse, Travis Perry, Trent Noah and Ansley Almonor, also checked in, but the Wildcats quickly found themselves in a hole down 11-4.
From there, however, UK arrived, going on an 11-0 scoring run to take the lead, which it would not surrender.
Kentucky remained steadily ahead throughout the first half and even made the lead double digits before going into halftime leading by nine thanks to a 3-pointer from Chandler.
Back out for the second half, Kentucky quickly extended its lead back to double digits, holding a 12-point advantage at the first timeout of the second half.
Shooting well over 50% from beyond the arc, Kentucky continued to be able to hold its lead over the Tigers, making the score 62-48 with just over 11 minutes left to play.
Things would get a bit more engaging around the seven-minute mark when the Tigers made a push to get back within single digits for the first time since the beginning of the half.
The Cats wouldn’t respond to the push the same way they had prior ones, however, as Missouri was able to make its scoring run 10-0 to get back within five with over six minutes to play.
With Kentucky’s stars continuing to score points, the advantage was back at eight with just seconds more than three minutes remaining on the clock.
While Missouri would never give up in the contest, Kentucky was able to do enough to keep it out of reach after briefly extending the lead back to double digits with over two minutes to play.
Eventually, the final buzzer would grant UK a significant victory to wrap up the regular season.
Kentucky will return to action in the 2025 SEC Tournament, enjoying a first-round bye thanks to its 2-0 week. The Wildcats will play their first game on Thursday, March 13, with the games being staggered based on the ending time of the game prior. The entire second round will be aired live on the SEC Network.
