Thursday, March 11, 2010

SEC Tournament Notes

As I type this, South Carolina and Alabama are tipping off in the first game of this year's Southeastern Conference Tournament. The team picked to win, (and my favorite also) the Wildcats from the University of Kentucky do not take the court until tomorrow at one o'clock. UK is the number one seed overall and number one in the East side of the bracket.

The following is an excerpt from UK's athletic website and is a demonstration of UK's unequaled dominance in the Southeastern Conference.

"The Wildcats have enjoyed unparalleled success in the league’s postseason tournament. In the 49 years the event has been held, Kentucky has captured 25 titles and has won 84 percent of its games in the tourney. Next in line among the schools in tournament titles is Alabama with six. Since the tournament was renewed in 1979, 10 different schools have captured the trophy. Only Vanderbilt and South Carolina have failed to win the event. Kentucky is the only team to win the event 12 times since 1979, including titles in seven of the eight years in the 1990s. During that decade, the Wildcats lost only one SEC Tournament game in 24 tries."

With the conclusion of the regular season on Sunday, UK won it's 44th regular season title with the last coming in 2005. If they were to pull out a win in this year's tourney, it will be their 26th overall title and the first since 2004.

The Southeastern Conference unveiled its men’s basketball coaches postseason awards Tuesday. Four UK players garnered honors. John Wall was named SEC Player of the Year. DeMarcus Cousins won the title of SEC Freshman of the Year. Cousins, Wall and junior, Patrick Patterson were all voted First Team All-SEC by league coaches, while Cousins, Wall and Eric Bledsoe were all named to the SEC All-Freshman team. Patterson was also selected to the league's All-Defensive team.

Notably absent from these honors was UK's head coach, John Calipari. SEC Coach of the Year honors went to Kevin Stallings of Vandy. Not to take anything away from Coach Stallings, after all he did lead Vandy to a second-place finish in the SEC, but let's have a look at what all Coach Cal has done at UK: (via rivals.yahoo.com)

"In the four seasons before Calipari took over at Kentucky, the Wildcats lost an average of 13 games a season, produced just two NCAA tournament victories and even stooped to play in the NIT. Calipari instantly turned that around upon taking over for Billy Gillispie, blending a star-studded recruiting class with a solid group of returnees to transform Kentucky into a Final Four contender.

• Kentucky won the SEC East; Vanderbilt finished two games back.
• Kentucky (29-2) has already won seven more games than it did last year; Vanderbilt (23-7) has won four more.
• Kentucky played Vanderbilt twice in the regular season and won both times."

I am gonna wrap this post up now. It is just after two o'clock and I have been writing this post and watching the first-half of the SC/Alabama for about an hour now. South Carolina is up at the half. Obviously, watching the game a little more than typing but for good reason. The winner of this game is the one that UK will play tomorrow afternoon.

More later this afternoon!

- b

1 comment:

  1. Update: Alabama won this game earlier today with a final score of 68-63. Thank goodness! I really wasn't looking forward to UK having to play South Carolina again. You might recall that SC and TN are the only teams to beat UK this season.

    Best of luck tomorrow Wildcats vs. Alabama.

    C-A-T-S, CATS, CATS, CATS!!!

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