UK Legend Ralph Beard Dies

Sad to report that Kentucky legend Ralph Beard has died. He was 79.

Beard was a member of the legendary “Fab Five” under coach Adolph Rupp, and won titles in 1948 and 1949.

Highlights:

• NCAA Championship: 1948 and 1949
• Olympic gold medal 1948
• 3-time Consensus All-American
• Four-time All-SEC First Team
• 1,517 points
• Jersey Retired #12
• Played in NBA’s first All-Star game in 1951

My thoughts go out to the entire family.

Sign guest book for Ralph Beard

Hump Links: U-G-L-Y

First, I’d like to give some observations about last night’s win over Stony Brook 62-52. How many languages can you say “Ugly”? This was simply a terrible game for the Cats.

If it wasn’t for Patrick Patterson (19 points, 12 boards) and Perry Stevenson (18 points, 10 rebounds), I don’t know what they would have done.

The only bright spots were Stevenson showing us something good and Kentucky continuing the 3 point streak with their one and only three of the night (1-10).

Game quotes and stats can be found here.

Wouldn’t you liked to have been a fly on the wall after the game? I’m sure Gillispie gave them a piece of his mind. Also practice will surely not be any fun this week.

Looking Ahead

Up next for the Cats is UNC on Saturday. They better get it together quick or it could be very ugly this weekend.

Two possible scenarios?

• Kentucky wins in a close game
• Kentucky loses very terribly

Patrick Patterson is already looking forward to the game.

I’m looking forward to playing against Tyler Hansbrough. He’s one of the best big men in the country, and I’m looking forward to challenging him. He really is one of the best big men out there and, me being a freshman, this will be a good college opportunity for me.”

Related: UNC’s Ty Lawson may be limited in the Kentucky game.

Post Game

Fact filled UK-Stony Brook post-game from John Clay.

Wrap-up from KentuckySportsRadio.com

Starter Picking

You may have noticed coach using different lineups. Gillispie has been using competitive practices to pick game starters.

Troubles

We learned this week that Jodie Meeks isn’t recovering very well from his injury and may not play again this season. Billy Gillispie is very concerned about this.

It doesn’t look good for him. “He’s not been able to do anything. That’s pretty disappointing to me.”

This is certainly terrible news that we didn’t need.

It also came out that walk-on Kerry Benson has quit the team, but will remain as a student.

Compete Dammit

Coach Gillispie is trying to drive competitiveness into his players.

I think you can increase the competitive level of some guys.” “But I don’t know you can get from a real low point to a real high point. It’s very difficult if you have a totally non-competitive person. If a person is somewhat competitive, they can become more competitive.”

Patterson Honor

On Monday Patrick Patterson was named SEC Freshman of the Week. He averaged 22 points, 8.5 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 3.0 steals.

This may be the first of a few he’ll get this season.

Catching up with the Cats

I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving and didn’t eat too much.

I would also like to to mention the big football game over the weekend. What a shame! I really thought they would pull it out, but you got to give them credit. Both teams played an excellent instant classic.

Now for some basketball…

I didn’t get to see the Liberty game, but did catch the Texas Southern game…so I’ll comment about that. I thought the Cats played well, but it’s hard to gauge a whole lot when the team they played is not very good.

Some Player Thoughts

Patrick Patterson keeps showing the kinds of numbers he’s capable of…lets just hope this happens against stiffer competition also.

Joe Crawford had an excellent game and is starting to show some signs of what’s expected of him this season.

I expected to see more from Alex Legion, but it’s just not happening with him right now. We all know he can get the shot down, what’s going on? Hopefully he breaks out at some point.

Overall, the team is looking improved and better be, when the Cats host UNC Saturday.

Next up for Kentucky is Stony Brook tomorrow at 7pm EST.

Hump Links: Back to Action

The Cats are back in action tonight hosting Liberty, game time is set for 7:00 EST.

You can find quotes and comments pertaining to the the game and also about the return to action here.

It seems that’s it’s been forever since they’ve last played. Hopefully, the time off has allowed the team to grow a little and adjust. The next few games are going to be important, as large test against UNC and IU loom. As in the Gardner-Webb game, there are no guarantees, but I hope that the team will find a good rhythm going into these upcoming games.

Returning

Here’s a story on the Cats returning to action, after the layoff.

Perry Stevenston on getting back to action…

I don’t think I’ve ever waited that long to play another game.” “We just can’t wait to get back on the floor.

Coach Gillispie on the early loss to Gardner-Webb…

That’s definitely not acceptable to me.” “That’s no disrespect to our opponents, but that’s not something that should have happened.”

Overview

Bleacher Report, gives an overview of the SEC East.

Possible Pickup

Kentucky is in the running for forward Leonard Washington, who was once a Top 25 prospect.

Kentucky is very strong right now,” the coach, Dinos Trigonis, said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if Kentucky was the choice.”

If everything works out, he could be eligible at end of this fall semester.

The Washington View

Tru, of A Sea of Blue, gives his take on Leonard Washington and the madness surrounding him.

(He also breaks down highlights from coach Gillispie’s call-in show.)

Wildcats Thunder Blog also has reaction to the Leonard Washington saga.

Headlines and Happenings

Signings

We ended signing the two expected recruits in Darius Miller and DeAndre Liggins. (No surprise there) We also lost one in Chris Singleton, who chose FSU. This shouldn’t be a big shocker, because as of late everything was pointing him that way.

Some good news is that Scotty Hopson is delaying his signing. Maybe this will lead him to take a closer look at the Cats. Who Knows?

We do need a big man and hopefully there’s one to be found somewhere.

Noted is this article

According to Scout.com recruiting analyst Dave Telep…

Gillispie might have trouble finding a big man for the spring signing period”

From Scout.com recruiting analyst Jeff Goodman…

If a player does emerge during the course of the high school season, UK will be on him.” “Their staff is the type that will turn over every stone to find the player”

Now, with these additions yesterday some rankings have come out. According to Scout.com we have the 13th-best recruiting class. Rivals.com ranks it the 19th-best.

Billy Gillispie held his presser yesterday and talked about the signings and gave his thoughts on that. He also talked about the injuries of Jodie Meeks and Derrick Jasper. You can find more quotes from the conference here.

We are really excited about the two guys that we added today. They are guys we were interested since we got here. I worked very diligently to get those guys on board so I am really excited about getting these two guys to come play Kentucky basketball. They are good players. It is always good to get guys that are close to home, but not for that reason. I think every single school would like to get guys that are close to home, but we don’t recruit guys just because they are from a particular state, but because they are good and Darius (Miller) (from Maysville, Ky.) is really good.”

On Darius Miller…

I think Darius is a tremendous athlete. He can do anything. He has been very well coached and very well taught. His dad was a really good player. I don’t want to brag on him to much. He still plays all the time with him. He has great knowledge and he is tough. The tougher the game, the better he is. He can score from the perimeter and he can really shoot the three. He can drive it to 15 feet and jump over a defender because of his size. He has great athletic ability and he is tough enough to get inside to get some of those baskets. You could not draw up two better players for me than he and DeAndre (Liggins).”

On DeAndre Liggins…

Both of them have great versatility. DeAndre is a guy who can initiate offense. He is going to be a tremendous ball-pressure defender, as Darius can be as well. These guys are basketball players. They have things that they need to continue to work just like everyone else does but are great basketball players. They have great feel for the game and they have great understanding of the game. They work hard and I think that gives you great versatility when you have guys like that on your roster.”

Thoughts

JL Blue of A Sea of Blue, gives his take on not landing Chris Singleton. (What Singleton means, and what he doesn’t …)

The Courier-Journal’s Rick Bozich, gives his analysis of yesterday’s signings.

Rupp

The National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame will be honoring Adolph Rupp Sunday night at Kansas City’s new Sprint Center.

He will be one of four “Founding Fathers”, along with Phog Allen, Henry Iba and John McLendon to be honored.

Breaking News: Chris Singleton

Recruit Chris Singleton made his decision and it was FSU over Kentucky.

In other News

Scotty Hopson will not be signing with Mississippi State, for now.

With Singleton out of the picture, this may leave Hopson looking more at UK.

Hump Links

Today starts the Official signing period.

Darius Miller has apparently already signed his LOI (see below).

Chris Singleton is expected to announce his decision sometime this afternoon. It’s down to Kentucky and Florida State.

---

Jodie Meeks

Injuries continue to plague the Cats. This time it’s Jodie Meeks, who’s suffering from a stress fracture in his groin. Word is that he could miss up to a month or more of action.

Related: Jodie Meeks out 4-6 weeks

(Also it’s rumored that Ramel Bradley has some kind of injury to his foot/ankle.)

This is all we need! This isn’t looking good at all.

Signed, Sealed and Delivered

Darius Miller has officially signed his LOI to Kentucky.

Billy Gillispie

Coach Gillispie will speak sometime this afternoon. It’s expected he will talk about LOI’s being signed etc. Hopefully, he’ll also address the injury talk of Jodie Meeks and Ramel Bradley.

Billy Gillispie: Funny? Satire

Coach Billy Gillispie reached the Serious Sports News Network website, with their post “Billy Gillispie asked for A&M job back after loss to Gardner-Webb“.

It is true that Billy called to see if we might take him back. While we are grateful for everything he did for the A&M basketball program, we declined his offer and are looking forward to a great future with Coach Turgeon,” Byrne read from a prepared statement. “And even if we were interested, the folks who pay our players— er, pay for a lot of equipment an whatnot for our players… Well, they don’t really want a coach who loses to schools like Gardner-Webb.”

It’s getting ridiculous, isn’t it? Are we ever going to get away from this loss?

Next Page »