The Kentucky Kernel’s Aaron Smith explains how the Cats are stepping up late in the season.

In the opening months of the season, even as UK was rolling to win after win after win with only an Indiana loss as a setback, head coach John Calipari kept saying it. The Cats were only in first or second gear. They still had work to do on the inner mechanics, still had things to fine-tune.

The Kentucky Kernel’s Morgan Rhodes looks at how the Cats played up to their ranking against Florida.

But, the scary thing is, in the 20 point victory over Florida, UK really wasn’t firing on all cylinders. UK didn’t play bad by any means, but just imagine if every player was playing his best… SCARY!

The Lexington Herald-Leader’s Jerry Tipton discusses how UK head coach John Calipari wants a team to “come out and go nutty on us.”

Perhaps, Vanderbilt will give Kentucky such a test Saturday night in Nashville. In addition to making UK show its resolve, a nail-biter (as opposed to another nail-filer) would make a good show for ESPN’s GameDay.

The Herald Leader also has an image gallery detailing the Cats’ stats as they prepare to take on Vanderbilt.

Karla Ward of the Herald-Leader reports on the death of former UK basketball player Jim Dinwiddie.

Dinwiddie was a 6-4 guard who played for the Wildcats under Adolph Rupp for three seasons, from 1968 to 1971, scoring 277 points over his career.

Matt Norlander of CBS Sports doesn’t believe Ohio State is too far behind the Cats.

Ohio State is the one I’ve got my eye on. You know, the team who also has a player-of-the-year candidate, multiple future pros and a defense that’s better than anyone’s, statistically, in the country. The Buckeyes absolutely deserve inclusion into the club — not that they ever were unworthy enough to get kicked out. In the wake of Kentucky’s cruise-control win over Florida last night, and surely with commentary cooking in the oven right now, you’d be easily led to believe college hoops’ hierarchy looks like this:

Kentucky

Eamonn Brennan of ESPN.com goes into detail about the final two minutes and 38 seconds for Duke guard Austin Rivers against North Carolina on Wednesday.

The Blue Devils looked dead more than once in the second half, at the mercy of a team too strong on the boards, too fast on the break, too good in too many ways, just too much. But each time the Tar Heels looked set to finally, forcefully pull away, Rivers hit a big 3 to keep them alive.