1.  With a six-man rotation, Kentucky would benefit from landing the East Division’s #2 seed and the bye that goes with it… which is still possible.

2.  Thanks to a tight win over Vanderbilt on Tuesday, John Calipari believes his team will now feel it can win a tight game at in Knoxville on Sunday.

3.  Darrin Horn says South Carolina will have to focus on defense and rebounding to beat Tennessee in Columbia tonight.

4.  Hard work has paid off for the Cocks’ Sam Muldrow.

5.  Tennessee won’t have starting big man Brian Williams when they visit the Gamecocks tonight.

6.  The Vols need for Cameron Tatum to shoot his way out of a lengthy slump.

No one — no one outside the Bluegrass State anyway — expected Kentucky young team in 2010-11 to duplicate the amazing feats of UK’s young team in 2009-10.  But most didn’t expect the kind of struggles these Cats have endured either.

UK is 16-5 overall but just 4-3 in the SEC.  They have lost three out of four on the road in the league and a game-and-a-half behind Florida in the East Division standings.  And now they will enter the toughest part of their schedule: at Florida, Tennessee at home, at Vanderbilt.  That as the Cats come off a shocking road loss at Ole Miss.

“… If you think this stuff’s hard, wait until you see what we’ve got coming up.  We’ve got a tough road.”

Calipari wants to see his team display more toughness in adverse situations as they move down that road.  “We’ve got to want it worse than the other team, and if we do that, we’re a pretty good team,” the coach told The Louisville Courier-Journal.  “We’re a step ahead.  If they want it worse than us, and they’re more physical and they’re grabbing and holding and we’re not fighting back, then we’re what you saw today.”

Wanted to knock out some news before diving into our signing day coverage this morning.  For those who weren’t watching SEC basketball last night, the West pulled yet another upset over the East and Florida inched a bit closer toward the East Division title.

Last night in Oxford, Kentucky dropped its third SEC road game in four contests.  The Ole Miss Rebels “battled and wanted it more” according to John Calipari.

Credit Rebel guard Chris Warren who capped a 22-point night with a 25-footer with 2.9 seconds remaining to give UM the 71-69 victory.  For Ole Miss, it was just the second win in seven SEC games overall. 

The win was also just the 13th all-time for UM against the Cats in 109 games.  And it was the West’s fourth win over the East since Saturday.

In the nightcap, Florida took care of business at home with a 65-61 win over Vanderbilt.  The Gators’ Kenny Boynton knocked down a corner jumper with just over one minute to play in overtime to put the Commodores ahead for good in the back-and-forth game.

Vandy’s John Jenkins got a good look on the other end of the floor but put up an air ball.  Kevin Stallings made it clear that he thought the refs missed a foul on the play.

“He doesn’t shoot many air balls.  I’ve watched him play for a long time and I haven’t seen many air balls come off that kid’s hand.”  VU’s coach likely avoided a fine with his careful wording.

Indeed, there did appear to be contact on the play, but it’s not often the road team gets a call like that in the game’s final seconds.  (It should be noted that Vandy sent the game into overtime when they were given foul shots with less than 25 seconds to play in regulation)

In the East race, Florida is now in first place with a 6-2 record trailed by Tennessee (4-2), Kentucky (4-3), South Carolina (3-3), Vandy (3-4) and Georgia (3-4).

The Commodores have now dropped two games in a row following a Saturday loss at home to Arkansas.  For the Gators, last night’s win was its third overtime victory over an East rival on the season.

The East is a beast and the West is a mess.  Such is the state of SEC basketball in 2011.  For that reason, we’ll take a closer look here at the East Division only.  (Handicapping the West seems unfair as that division is handicapped enough as is.)

Last night’s win by Florida in Athens was the second road game the Gators have stolen from an East rival this year.  First Tennessee, then Georgia, both in overtime… which says something for the Gators’ maturity. 

For an up-and-down team, Billy Donovan’s squad seems to have hit a prolonged up.  It looks like they’re in the driver’s seat in the East Division.  But are they really?  Here are the current division standings:

Now let’s look at each squad’s remaining games:

Florida 5-1
SEC Games Remaining: 10
Against SEC West: 3
Home Games: 5

Kentucky 3-2
SEC Games Remaining: 11
Against SEC West: 3
Home Games: 6

South Carolina 3-2
SEC Games Remaining: 11
Against SEC West: 4
Home Games: 5

Vanderbilt 2-2
SEC Games Remaining: 12
Against SEC West: 5
Home Games: 6

Tennessee 2-2
SEC Games Remaining: 12
Against SEC West: 5
Home Games: 6

Georgia 3-3
SEC Games Remaining: 10
Against SEC West: 4
Home Games: 4


Tennessee and Vanderbilt still have five West teams remaining on their schedules.  That’s a big plus.  Kentucky and Florida only have three games each remaining with West foes.  And that’s a minus.

To break things down further, let’s take a closer look at the games against the West and the remaining home games for each East Division team.  Any East team hoping to win the division title in 2011 needs to avoid losses to the weaker teams from the West.  Also, any team aiming for the division crown can’t afford to lose at home to their East Division rivals.  Consider those two areas to be a simple matter of “taking care of business” or “TCB” as Elvis would have said. 

The East championship will be decided by those two factors:

1.  Who slips up against the West?

2.  Who slips up at home against East foes?

If we count each team’s remaining West Division games as victories, the standings board looks like this:

Now let’s go ahead and hand out wins for each SEC East game a team has remaining in its own gym, too.

East vs East home games remaining:

Florida (4) — Vanderbilt, Kentucky, Tennessee, Georgia

Kentucky (5) – Georgia, Tennessee, South Carolina, Florida, Vanderbilt

South Carolina (3) — Florida, Georgia, Tennessee

Vanderbilt (4) — South Carolina, Kentucky, Tennessee, Florida

Tennessee (3) — South Carolina, Georgia, Kentucky

Georgia (2) — Vanderbilt, South Carolina


Clearly, Kentucky holds an advantage in this area as all five of its home games against East foes still lay ahead.  South Carolina and Tennessee have already played two East opponents at home and each lost one of those games.  That hurts.  But Georgia is in real trouble in this area.  The Bulldogs have just two more East Division games at home this year… and they’ve already lost two of the three East home games they’ve played.

Let’s go ahead and count each team’s East Division home games as victories and look at the updated standings:

So what does all this tell us?  It tells us that based on the games already played plus the remaining games versus the West and the remaining games at home versus East foes…  Florida is in the driver’s seat in the SEC East.  Kentucky and Vanderbilt are just a game back — waiting for a Gator slip-up — if they handle matters as they should.

The climb is a bit more steep for South Carolina and Tennessee.  And Georgia — having lost two East battles at home already — will have to do some serious road work to capture the division title this season.

If you’re a betting man, you might want to drop a couple of bucks on the Gators in the East.  The remaining schedule is setting up pretty nicely for Donovan’s crew.

The SEC has named its Players of the Week in basketball for the past week’s action and both honorees play in the East Division.

Tennessee guard Scotty Hopson has been named the SEC Player of the Week for his MVP performance in the NIT Season Tip-Off tourney.  Hopson averaged 18 points, 6 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game for the Vols, who won the tourney with an upset of seventh-ranked Villanova.

Kentucky forward Terrence Jones earned SEC Freshman of the Week honors following his outstanding play in the EA Sports Maui Invitational.  Jones averaged 23 points, 11.3 rebounds and 3.3 blocks per game in Hawaii.  He scored 29 points against Oklahoma and dragged down 17 rebounds against Washington.

Don’t be surprised to see these two honored often this season.