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BASKETBALL PREVIEWCELEBRATING 38 YEARS OF INDEPENDENCE

OCTOBER 28, 2009 WWW.KYKERNEL.COMWEDNESDAY

DeMarcus Cousins, the No. 2 recruit according to Rivals.com, averaged just under a point perminute he played in the McDonald’s All-American Game. He’s expected to help Patterson in the post.

Daniel Orton, a 6-foot-10 forward from Oklahoma, originally committed to UK under Billy Gillispie,but honored his commitment even after John Calipari arrived. Orton will help Patterson on the boards.

John Wall,already considereda candidate to bepicked first overallin next summer’sNBA draft, isalready garneringpreseason honorsand is one of themost-hyped UKrecruits in recentmemory. Wall isexpected to be thepoint guard thatfinally gets Patter-son his tournamentberth.

Eric Bledsoe, aspeedy freshman

point guard, hopes tobe the next UK greatto wear No. 24. He’ll

follow in the footstepsof Kelenna Azubuike,Antoine Walker and

Jamal Mashburn, whowere all forwards.

Bledsoe is expected toprovide a stable back-

up at point guard.

He’s back

Patrick Patterson, ajunior forward, has been Mr.Everything for the Cats thelast two years, but he hasnever played in the NCAAtournament.

(can they help get him to the NCAA tournament?)

PORTRAITS BY ED MATTHEWS | STAFF

A

PAGE A2 | Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Degree, NCAA tournamentkeep Patterson from NBA

By Ben [email protected]

Jon Hood has never played a game withPatrick Patterson.

But if you ask the freshman guard aboutthe junior forward, his eyes widen. He shakeshis head when talking about his teammate,like he can’t believe there’s a player — or aperson — quite like Patterson.

“Pat’s the guy. Pat’s amazing,” Hood says,slowing as he speaks. It’s almost as if heknows that he has to be perfect when speakingabout Patterson, that anything else would be adisservice to his teammate. “The way he is onthe court and the way he is off the court, theperson that he is … All of us look up to him,whether we will admit it or not. Pat’s workedso hard at this, he’s worked so hard to getwhere he is and he deserves every moment ofthis.”

Work. That’s a word that’s thrown arounda lot when teammates talk about Patterson,who averaged 17.9 points, 9.3 rebounds and2.1 blocks last year en route to first team All-Southeastern Conference honors. He spent thesummer in San Francisco with freshman for-ward Daniel Orton getting in even bettershape. When other players limp out of thetraining room after practice now, Patterson isstill on the treadmill.

There’s nothing about Patterson that does-n’t impress teammates. His leadership skills,ability in the classroom and work ethic go be-yond any measureable basketball statistic.

But there is one thing about Patterson’s ré-sumé that’s been less-than-impressive in hisfirst two seasons. He entered the program asone of the highest-rated recruits to join theCats in recent memory and was immediatelycounted on to be a starter.

He responded, setting the pace in the posteven as a freshman before a stress fracture inhis ankle stopped him. He missed the rest of

the season — including the Cats’ first-roundexit in the 2008 NCAA tournament. Pattersonmissed the 2009 tournament too, as the Catsfloundered midseason and limped to a 22-14record.

His failure to play in the tournament issomething he hears about constantly, and it’sone of his biggest motivations

“I know he wants to get on that big stage,”Hood said. “That’s what Pat thrives for, is thatbig stage. If we can do anything to get himthere, we’ll do as much as we can to get himthere.”

Patterson missed two games with anotherankle injury last season. He said he prays for ahealthy season, but even that pales in compar-ison to his desire to make it to the NCAA tour-nament.

“The No. 1 goal I want is making it to theNCAA tournament,” Patterson said.

The NCAA tournament looms large inwhat will be Patterson’s third — and possiblyfinal — year at UK. He’s expected to graduateafter this year, and could enter the NBA draftfor next summer with a successful season un-der his belt.

Patterson tested the NBA waters after lastseason before deciding to come back for histhird year. But UK head coach John Calipariwouldn’t make it that easy on him. The twomet, and Calipari wanted to know why he wascoming back.

“He told me he wanted to graduate inthree years,” Calipari said. “He’d never playedin an NCAA Tournament and he regretted that,and the third thing he said was, ‘I need to playin your style of game if I’m really going to bea good pro, because right now I’m playing un-der the basket and I know I’m not going to dothat at the next level.’ ”

With that, Patterson returned. He’ll be ex-pected to be one of the leaders on this year’s

PHOTO BY BRITNEY MCINTOSH | STAFFJunior forward Patrick Patterson returned to UK for his third season after putting his name in the NBAdraft. He hasn’t played in an NCAA tournament game to this point in his career.

By Metz [email protected]

They’re the transformers, the rebuildersand the great hope. Whatever you want to callthem, freshmen superstars John Wall, DeMar-cus Cousins, Daniel Orton and Eric Bledsoeare four of the most high-profile recruits tocome to UK in years.

UK basketball fans were quick to callthem the stars of what they considered to bethe best recruiting class of all-time. The ana-lysts said they might be right.

“It’s added pressure to the program, butwe still have to work,” Cousins said. “Nomatter how good they say we are, we stillhave to work.”

The comparisons to Michigan’s “FabFive” came quickly and should follow theCats from the first game to the last. With fourof the top 25 recruits in the country, accordingto Rivals.com, the comparison came naturally.

“We’re a part of history now, I guess youcould say,” Cousins said. “They’re making usheroes before we even play a college game.It’s added on pressure, but none of us are wor-ried about it. We’re just ready to get going.”

One concern for the young group of fresh-men was how well they’d get along. With somuch talent in one class, many believed per-sonalities would clash. But the four said theyconstantly hang out together, even off the court.

UK head coach John Calipari likes the factthat the players all live together under the sameroof. Calipari said it forces the team to workout its differences and talk things out like men.

Cousins said everything’s been going well sofar and he’s not surprised they’ve gotten along.

“That’s just the type of people we are,”Cousins said. “There’s no selfishness, there’sno arrogance, no big head, there’s none ofthat. We’re all just cool, down-to-earth peo-ple.”

Bledsoe, Cousins and Wall have becomeparticularly close.

“They call us the three amigos,” Wallsaid. “We’re pretty close, even if it isn’t usthree together, we try to help all the otherfreshmen out to bring them together.”

One relationship everybody is especiallyconcerned about and eager to see how it de-velops during the season is that of Wall and

Wall

Orton

Cousins

Bledsoe

See Patterson on page A3

See Recruits on page A3

Recruits aim to revive program

Wednesday, October 28, 2009 | PAGE A3

By Metz [email protected]

It was laughed at, ridiculed andwasn’t well-represented in the NCAATournament.

In the eyes of many college basket-ball analysts, the Southeastern Confer-ence was just plain bad last season.

However, UK’s players won’t allagree with that sentiment. They said itwas underrated, pointing to the starplayers on various teams like JarvisVarnado at Mississippi State and Tas-min Mitchell at Louisiana State.

The lack of respect from across thecountry in 2009 is starting to turnaround, and players and coaches arestarting to get recognized by the peoplethat follow the sport closely.

“It’s amazing,” junior forwardPatrick Patterson said. “I was listeningto all the critics from these past twoyears and how they say the SEC isdown and all of a sudden they say theSEC is up and probably one of the bestconferences this year. It’s just great foreverybody here.”

Last season the SEC sent a mere

three teams to the Big Dance. LSU, aNo. 8 seed, was the only team to ad-vance past the first round. The Tigerslost in the second round to eventual na-tional champion North Carolina.

The SEC had three teams with re-cruiting classes ranked inside the top25, according to Rivals.com, includingUK’s No. 1 class. Though currently un-der investigation by the NCAA to de-termine his eligibility, Mississippi Staterecruit Renardo Sidney is expected tocontribute immediately. Kenny Boyn-ton at Florida, John Jenkins at Vander-bilt and Reginald Buckner at Ole Missare also all ranked inside the top 30, inaddition to UK’s four recruits in the top30.

“I look at Tennessee and they stillhave all the great players, from Scotty(Hopson) to Tyler (Smith) and (Wayne)Chism,” Patterson said. “They still haveall the great players and Florida as wellwith the new personnel they have com-ing in, they still have Alex Tyus there.So I’m just tremendously happy that allthese great teams are being recognizedlike they should.”

In 2006, the SEC had two schools

make the Final Four, and Florida won itall in 2006 and 2007. Since then, Ten-nessee is the only team to make it to theSweet Sixteen. In that same two-yearspan, eight Big East teams have gone toat least the Sweet Sixteen.

With the additions of young headcoaches like Anthony Grant at Alabamaand Mark Fox at Georgia, more opti-mism arises. Grant and Fox both ex-celled at smaller schools in VirginiaCommonwealth and Nevada, respec-tively, and made the NCAA Tourna-ment almost routinely.

The addition of new coaches andhigh-profile recruits has the playersexcited for a rebirth of SEC basket-ball.

“The SEC is definitely becomingone of the best conferences in thecountry,” said senior guard RamonHarris. “A lot of people talk about theBig East and stuff like that, but Ithink the SEC, even through the lastcouple years, has really been a solidconference … A lot of top-scale re-cruits are coming to the SEC teamsand it’s only going to make the com-petition better.”

SEC rebounds from bad reputation

team on and off the court, andhe’ll be the guy the Cats look tofor a high-percentage shot late inclose games. Already one of themost seasoned players as a junior,Patterson is used to the responsi-bility.

The same young roster thatmakes Patterson one of the oldestplayers on the team has broughtwith it new expectations. To Pat-terson, there’s nothing wrong withthat. He’s embraced the responsi-bilities and expectations laid uponhim from the day he arrived oncampus. This season will be nodifferent.

“We want to be one of thegreatest teams to play here at Ken-tucky and we want to be that typeof historic team and that type ofteam remembered by everybodyacross the world and especially inKentucky,” Patterson said. “Wewant to be undefeated, we want towin the national championship, wewant to win everything we can winand we want everybody to be assuccessful as they can be.”

PATTERSONContinued from page A2

Bledsoe. As the No. 1 andNo. 3 point guard recruitsin the country, according toRivals.com, many criticswere quick to say the twocouldn’t co-exist. Thoseconcerns haven’t provedtrue to this point, thoughthings can change quicklyin the season.

“I read what everybodysaid about ‘why am I think-ing about going there? Whyis he thinking about goingthere? It’s the same school,you all are some of the toptwo point guards in thecountry,’ ” Wall said. “Wejust look at it as he’s acompetitive person, I’m acompetitive person. When Istepped on the scene forpick-up in the summer Ijust said, ‘Let’s make eachother better,’ and ever sincethat day we’ve just con-nected like we were broth-

ers, like we came from thesame mother. It’s great tohave him and I can’t waitto play with him.”

And the upperclassmencan’t wait to play with theyoung guns. After failing tomake the NCAA Tourna-ment a year ago, a firstsince 1991, the Cats areranked by many analysts inthe top 10, and are amongthe favorites to make it to

Indianapolis for the FinalFour. For seniors like Ra-mon Harris, that’s a wel-come change.

“The thing about ourincoming new players isthat they always listen,”Harris said. “There’s somethings you can’t tell themand they’ll have to gothrough a game for them-selves, but they try to listenas much as possible.”

RECRUITSContinued from page A2

PHOTO BY BRITNEY MCINTOSH | STAFFFrom left, star freshmen John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins andEric Bledsoe joke around at men’s basketball photo day.

online Check out the Kernel’s SEC basketball picks www.kykernel.com

PAGE A4 | Wednesday, October 28, 2009

New coach gives sophomorea second chance at UK

The last time DeAndre Ligginsstepped off a basketball court, he justwanted to see his family.

Liggins’ freshman year started offpoorly and didn’tget any better aseach game cameand went. By sea-son’s end, the rela-tionship betweenLiggins and formerUK head coachBilly Gillispie wasbeyond repair.

After the Cats’season-ending lossat Notre Dame inthe National Invita-

tion Tournament, Liggins needed toget away.

“That day, I remember sitting therefrustrated,” Liggins said. “I didn’tknow what was going on. I just want-ed to be home with my family becauseI knew how it was going to go.”

One of the most curious figures oflast year’s team, Liggins even told theDanville Messenger-Advocate hewould not return to Lexington ifGillispie did.

So the 6-foot-6 guard went hometo his family in Chicago. Gillispie wasfired. A few days later, John Calipariwas hired.

Faced with a decision of whetheror not to come back, Liggins soughthis family’s advice.

Go back, they told him. Do every-thing right this time.

Liggins is back, aiming to movepast some of last year’s episodes. Per-haps the most well-known was againstKansas State, when Liggins refused tore-enter the game. He seemed to sufferall year because of it.

Not all of Liggins’ problems werebecause of Gillispie. When he wasgiven a chance, he seemed unwillingto slow down the pace of his game tofit that of his team.

This year, the Cats around Ligginsare faster. Much, much faster.

Word is, John Wall may be one ofthe fastest players in college basket-ball. By Wall’s estimation, fellowfreshman Eric Bledsoe doesn’t lag be-hind much (although Bledsoe flip-flopped their ranking).

And then there’s Liggins.“DeAndre, oh man,” Bledsoe said.

“He’s real smooth with the ball. Hecan change gears and get to the basketso fast and easy.”

Bledsoe added that he thought not

only could he and Wall share floortime, but Liggins could be out therewith them.

Three point guards?“All three of us understand the

game well enough as point guards andjust as players, we could make it work,”Bledsoe said. “If the three of us are exe-cuting, who’s going to stop that?”

Another new face of the Cats that’shelped Liggins along is assistant coachRod Strickland.

Strickland, a 17-year NBA veteran,is ninth on the NBA’s career assist list.Better yet, Strickland had a 2.8:1 as-sist-to-turnover ratio in his career.

Liggins struggled in that aspectlast year, and he now has someone toteach him who won’t just tell Ligginsto hold on to the ball, but will speakfrom experience on how to do it.

“He’s my type of coach. I want tolearn a lot from him,” Liggins said. “Iget tips and pointers from him. I re-member seeing him play just a littlebit. I remember how good he is withthe ball.”

Most of all, if Liggins wants to putlast season behind him, he’ll have toprove he’s grown up. He’ll have toprove he can weather adversity, be-cause if he doesn’t, Cal has Wall andBledsoe eager to play as many minutesas possible.

So far, Calipari has been impressedwith Liggins. He said former UK headcoach Joe B. Hall recently visited apractice. Hall told Calipari that Ligginswas the most improved player on theteam.

Calipari said Liggins is workinghard, doing well in school and arrivingon time where he needs to be (anotherdocumented problem last year).

As a result, basketball should be-come more about playing the game forLiggins and less about worrying abouteverything else.

Had Gillispie’s services been re-tained, one of his biggest recruitinggets would have come and gone, aone-year bust.

Instead, Liggins has a chance tomake an impact on what he called “aspecial year.”

“We have power forwards who playlike guards,” Liggins said. “I don’t knowhow it’ll end up, but we have a chanceto make it something pretty special.”

No matter how UK finishes inMarch (or April), let’s hope Ligginsgoes home happier than last time.

James Pennington is a journalismsenior. E-mail [email protected].

JAMESPENNINGTON

Kernelcolumnist

The third time’s the charm

By Ben [email protected]

Senior guard Ramon Harris remembers watch-ing an ESPN special on Tennessee basketball inhis senior year in high school. A player for theVolunteers was talking about having to play forthree coaches in four years, the last of which wascurrent Tennessee head coach Bruce Pearl, then inhis first season with the program.

“I was just sitting there like, ‘Man, I couldnever go through that,’ ” Harris said to himself atthe time. “Now I'm sitting through it.”

Fast-forward to 2009 and Harris and seniorforward Perry Stevenson are the first four-yearscholarship players for the Cats to play under threedifferent coaches since 1929, when John Mauer,Basil Hayden and Ray Elkund each coached in afour-year span. Mauer was succeeded by leg-endary coach Adolph Rupp in 1930.

Neither Stevenson nor Harris ever thought theywould be in a situation like this. Both expected tobe playing under former UK head coach TubbySmith.

“That's who you sign with,” Stevenson said.“But you just have to take everything as it comes.”

Now playing under UK head coach John Cali-pari, who succeeded Billy Gillispie in March,Stevenson and Harris have developed a specialbond. Senior guard Mark Krebs, who transferredinto the program, keeps them from being the onlyseniors, but they are the only ones left from theirrecruiting class.

Jodie Meeks left the program and was draft-ed by the Milwaukee Bucks and Michael Porterleft the team to be with his family after last sea-son.

Both players have had plenty of ups and

Harris, Stevenson cope withthird coach in four years

STAFF FILE PHOTOSenior forward Perry Stevenson will be playing underhis third UK head coach this season.

See Coaching on page A5

Dunlap finds her voice as a leaderBy Nick Craddock

[email protected]

Victoria Dunlap, a junior for-ward on the UK women’s basket-ball team, led the Cats in four sta-

tistical categorieslast season. Butshe failed to findher voice as aleader.

“I’d say inthe past I wasn’tany kind ofleader, I justplayed the flow

of being a freshman, being asophomore, letting the older peo-ple and upperclassmen do that,”Dunlap said. “Now that I’m anupperclassman, it’s just going tohave to be (leading by) example,vocally and me being an all-

around kind of leader.”As the Cats’ leading returning

scorer and rebounder, Dunlap re-alizes she can’t be content toshirk the pressure-packed mo-ments in games, especially hav-ing lost teammate and frontcourtsidekick Eleia Roddy to gradua-tion last spring.

This year, Dunlap, who alsoannounced her presence as a de-fensive dynamo by leading theCats in blocks and steals last sea-son, will look to regularly deliverthe clutch performances hercoaches and teammates expectfrom her.

Dunlap has already made itclear she is making strides in de-veloping her leadership skills tocomplement her physical talentson the court.

“(Dunlap’s) always been able

to lead by example from day oneshe stepped on campus,” said UKhead coach Matthew Mitchell.“She has great personality, butshe hasn’t always been able tochannel that into vocal leader-ship. I give her a lot of credit forworking at it. Just the fact thatshe recognizes she has to do thathas me optimistic she’ll be ableto get that goal accomplished.”

UK assistant coach ShalonPillow, who works closely withthe post players, has been partic-ularly impressed with Dunlap’sability to take the incomingfreshmen post players, BrittanyHenderson and Anna Cole, andguide them along before the startof their rookie campaigns.

“In most places, the hardest

See Dunlap on page A5

Dunlap

Wednesday, October 28, 2009 | PAGE A5

transition from high school to college is thetempo,” Pillow said. “Vic did a really goodjob in getting (Henderson and Cole) ready,

they made the transition alot smoother than mostpeople do.”Dunlap mentored Cole

in individual work-outs and team

practices; Colesaid she hasbeen apprecia-

tive of Dun-lap’s helpfulness

and availability,while she still tran-sitions into college

life.Cole added that Dunlap

will point out any mis-takes she’s making inpractices that might havegone unnoticed by thecoaches.

Dunlap’s offseasonpreparation has not strictly

been limited to off-the-court training, as Dun-lap looks to improve on last season’s domi-

nance in major statistical categories.Ball handling and free-throw shooting are

areas she said she could use improvement. Sheshot a paltry 55.6 percent from the foul linelast season.

“I’ve been working on my shooting, peri-od,” Dunlap said. “I know it has been hardtimes for me at the free-throw line.”

If Dunlap could improve her free-throwshooting to anywhere between 65 and 70 per-cent her game would be “transformed,”Mitchell said, alluding to the fact that shewould become a complete offensive threat.

Even with Dunlap’s current woes at theline, Pillow already believes Dunlap can com-pete against anyone, not just in the Southeast-ern Conference, but also the NCAA. Pillowalso joked that at least Dunlap’s free-throwshooting was not as bad as Shaquille O’Neal’sand that no team would adopt a “hack-a-Vic”strategy of intentionally fouling Dunlap.

Having improved in each of her two sea-sons statistically, Dunlap will look to improveagain this year. The best news for Dunlap ishow acclimatized she has become to her roleas a leader for UK, which should play somerole in determining how successful the Catsare this year.

“If you’re a leader on the team, you can’tjust worry about yourself,” Dunlap said. “Youhave to worry about your teammates and whatthey’re doing, and make sure their mindset isright.”

DUNLAPContinued from page A4

downs in their careers, andboth will likely be relegatedto a bench role this seasonafter starting last year. Allthat turmoil can be a bitoverwhelming at times, butboth players said they justtried to roll with the punchesand stay positive.

“It's definitely notplanned,” Harris said. “Espe-cially when you sign for acoach that you feel like youwant to spend all your yearswith, you get a change ofcoach and you kind of don't

know what to do. You don'tknow about the new coachthat's coming in, you don'tknow anything about hisstyle or what he likes anddoesn't like.”

It's not all bad, though.After going through all thatside by side, the two have

formed a unique bond.“We are roommates, so I

guess that'll make us evencloser,” Stevenson said.“Closer than I want to be, Iguess. I have to hear himsnore, and I'm sure he saysthe same thing about me if Ifall asleep first.”

Neither player wanted todiscuss some of the differ-ences between the threecoaches. While playing forthree coaches has been try-ing at times, it's also givenboth players a special oppor-tunity.

“It's just great becauseyou can learn from each ofthe coaches,” Stevensonsaid. “They all have differentstyles.”

COACHINGContinued from page A4

“You don’t know aboutthe new coach that’s

coming in...”RAMON HARRIS

Senior guard

PAGE A6 | Wednesday, October 28, 2009

By Nick [email protected]

The UK women’s basket-ball team faced an ailmentmuch worse than the H1N1virus last year: the injury bug.

Sometimes injuries, alongwith suspensions, dwindledthe Cats’ roster so much to-ward the end of the seasonthat UK was forced to dressjust seven players in theirFeb. 22 contest againstLouisiana State.

A small bench often leadsto difficulties when dealingwith foul trouble and fatigue,something UK head coachMatthew Mitchell is wellaware of.

“It gives you the ability todo some things when youhave a deeper roster,”Mitchell said. “You can playa little more up-tempo, andwhen you add talent, you cando some things offensivelythat we were challenged to dolast year, like shooting theperimeter shot.”

If there’s one group ofplayers the Cats can’t affordinjuries to this season, it’s thefrontcourt players. Currently,UK has Victoria Dunlap,Anna Cole, Brittany Hender-son and guard/forward hy-

brid Lydia Watkins as theirpotential low post players.An injury to one of thesefour could wreck the team’srotation and ultimately hin-der the team’s ability to openup shots for the outside play-ers.

Dunlap believes a healthyfrontcourt will enhance thechances of a dangerous of-fense.

“Who’s going to want toguard a 6-(foot)-7 girl (Cole)in the paint and want to dealwith people on the outside?”Dunlap said.

Ironically, some playerson last season’s roster stayedhealthy despite the fact theywere the most unlikely candi-dates to do so because of theirhistory of injuries.

Mitchell said everyone onthe roster this year is “in goodshape right now” and ready toget play started.

Mitchell said injuries arenot a valid excuse for UK’s16-16 record last season, butthat having healthy players,and more of them, obviouslyincreases UK’s chances ofwinning this year.

“You hope to have goodluck with injuries and we tryto prepare for injuries throughour strength and conditioning

program,” Mitchell said.“Then we just have to go outand work hard every day andsee how it all turns out.”

UK Hoops looks to avoid injuries

STAFF FILE PHOTOJunior guard Amber Smithplayed last season after suffer-ing a knee injury in the previousseason.

PHOTO BY ED MATTHEWS | STAFFUK head coach John Calipari addresses the crowd at Rupp Arena during Big Blue Madness on Oct. 16.Calipari said he would take talent over experience every time.