The Good, The Bad, The Ugly: Arizona St. Edition

[Joneslab]

The Good

* De'Aaron Fox messing around. As we've discussed for literally 15 years, Kentucky's triple-double drought is one of the weirder statistical anomalies in sports. That a program as powerful as Kentucky's has only one triple-double is truly baffling. And the guy who got the triple-double is nowhere near the who's who list of UK greats. After years of players flirting with it, Fox finally broke through last night. And I would imagine it won't be the last time this year.

* Bam's first five minutes. Bam was as responsible as anybody for setting the tone of that game. It was clear in the first two minutes that Arizona St. had nothing for him. Bam is a guy who I swear the statistics don't do justice. He attacks virtually every rebound, and I think he just ultimately wears other players down with how hard he plays.

* Briscoe. Briscoe quietly put together one of his best games as a Cat. Hit a couple of threes, bulldogged people in transition, hurt everybody who seemed to run into him. Just a solid game from UK's steadiest player so far.

* Hello Derek Willis. A tremendous first half for Willis and by far the best we've seen him play this year. Just active. Flying around. In on everything. That's the player we saw so often last year, and I was glad to see him last night.

* Dominique Hawkins' first half. Dominique continues to be a guy who plays the perfect role. His defense is hellishly annoying, he plays super hard, he kind of just folds in to what the team is doing. As well as Mulder has shot it, you can see why Cal keeps going back to Dom. He adds crazy value to this team.

* Malik Monk's highlight reel moment in the second half. One of the more spectacular plays you'll ever see a college player make.

* Brad Cal getting away from Rupp and finally hitting a shot. Nice to see.

* The rebounding. It seems like our fears about team rebounding were a tad premature. Arizona St. has a very small team, but still: +26. That's filthy.

* Thirty-three assists to nine turnovers. As Cal would say, "What?"

The Bad

ROFL

The Ugly

Please.

[KevinHall]

Only Crazzed could have found something bad or ugly about this game. Some insane numbers in the box score.

[teamchemistry15]

If I had to find one thing bad, which is also good, is that our point guard was the leading rebounder.

[J.Jennings]

So here's my question to fellow posters, would your rather have Tyler Ulis as your point guard or D. Fox? Not to knock Ulis but 6'3/6'4 frames with long arms who can do everything a 5"9 player can do makes a world of difference. Fox doesn't have his jump shot perfected but the form is there, just needs to work on it,completely different than a player like Briscoe or Rondo who will never become pure shooters.......



Anyways, this Kentucky team is flat out fast and dominates in nearly every facet of the game. What's crazy, we haven't even begin to scratch the surface and I don't want to get ahead of myself but sit back and enjoy, this team is already special with a team IQ off the charts to be so young......

[KevinHall]

^ You always want size. So far Fox has been everything and more as he was billed coming in. If he keeps progressing he will be the best pg Cal has had at UK or maybe anywhere.

[Joneslab]

So here's my question to fellow posters, would your rather have Tyler Ulis as your point guard or D. Fox?.

The main advantage Ulis had is that he could really shoot the ball. You couldn't back off him. Fox is obviously ridiculously hard to guard, but you can play off of him and he has trouble hitting those seventeen-footers at the front of the zone.

It really hasn't mattered a whole lot...yet. I do think it will be interesting to see how Fox operates against a bigger, more athletic, maybe more experienced team who can bully him a little and take away those drives. You couldn't bully Ulis even at his size.

The announcers last night were talking about the Wall/Rondo hybrid that Fox clearly is. That's a perfect comp for him. He's definitely one of the more spectacular players Kentucky has had under Cal, but that shooting deficiency has the potential to be a glaring weakness against better teams.

[teamchemistry15]

So here's my question to fellow posters, would your rather have Tyler Ulis as your point guard or D. Fox? Not to knock Ulis but 6'3/6'4 frames with long arms who can do everything a 5"9 player can do makes a world of difference. Fox doesn't have his jump shot perfected but the form is there, just needs to work on it,completely different than a player like Briscoe or Rondo who will never become pure shooters.......



Anyways, this Kentucky team is flat out fast and dominates in nearly every facet of the game. What's crazy, we haven't even begin to scratch the surface and I don't want to get ahead of myself but sit back and enjoy, this team is already special with a team IQ off the charts to be so young......

At this point it's a tough call but I would say by the end of the year we would all take Fox.

[Joneslab]

And we're going to see a show on Saturday.

In the McDonald's game Fox and Lonzo Ball went up against each other and Ball got the better of him. I would assume that'll be on Fox's mind this weekend.

[George]

Is Ball's shot still broke as hell? It was flat-out weird looking in the McD's game.

[J.Jennings]

I still say John Wall is the best point guard Cal has ever had regardless of what Fox does this year.John Wall may be one of the fastest players to ever play the game at the next level, it's kind of what he's known for.

My next question, Murray, Booker, or Monk???? This is tough, guess it just depends on what you want to do on offense and how you want to play. Booker the pure shooter, Murray the two way guard who can do a little bit of everything and Monk a two way guard who can do a little bit of everything and then some lol lol lol lol... Monk is flat out explosive and can only get better.....

[J.Jennings]

The main advantage Ulis had is that he could really shoot the ball. You couldn't back off him. Fox is obviously ridiculously hard to guard, but you can play off of him and he has trouble hitting those seventeen-footers at the front of the zone.

It really hasn't mattered a whole lot...yet. I do think it will be interesting to see how Fox operates against a bigger, more athletic, maybe more experienced team who can bully him a little and take away those drives. You couldn't bully Ulis even at his size.

The announcers last night were talking about the Wall/Rondo hybrid that Fox clearly is. That's a perfect comp for him. He's definitely one of the more spectacular players Kentucky has had under Cal, but that shooting deficiency has the potential to be a glaring weakness against better teams.

Tyler could shoot the ball and he had a heart of a champion.

[J.Jennings]

Anyone notice Monk and Fox wearing two different shoes last night??

[J.Jennings]

Bam is the player that we all wanted Julius Randle to be. Big, long arms, can bully, defend, rebound, dunk, and score when he wants...

Cal's bigs,,

Cousins best post scorer
Towns best all around big
Davis best defender

Anxious to see how Bam pans out this year....

[Owllycat]

Anyone notice Monk and Fox wearing two different shoes last night??

I pointed that out last night in the match thread.

[Joneslab]

I still say John Wall is the best point guard Cal has ever had regardless of what Fox does this year.John Wall may be one of the fastest players to ever play the game at the next level, it's kind of what he's known for.

I loved Wall. Loved him.

But he wasn't the best point guard. Turned it over like a madman, couldn't shoot. He was still hellaciously effective, but not like Ulis and Fox are. This is next-level stuff. Wall had the penchant for running full bore and losing the ball about 7 times a game; Fox runs full speed and controls the ball.