AUBURN, Ala. _ Toughness. We're bombarded with the incessant coach speak about toughness that after awhile we sort of get numb to the same old subject matter. Got to be tougher. Got to be stronger. Yada, yada, yada.
Then comes a game like the 40-minute wrestling match that was Kentucky's 75-66 loss to the Auburn Tigers at Auburn Arena on Saturday. Coach speak or no coach speak: Kentucky got out-toughed.
"The difference was the offensive rebounding," UK coach John Calipari said afterward, "and that comes down to toughness."
I know, I know, if you're a card-carrying member of Big Blue Nation you'd argue the difference had more to do with those fellows in the striped shirts who whistled the Wildcats for 29 personal fouls compared to 20 for the Tigers. As a result, Kentucky's stellar 20-for-24 showing from the free-throw line was no match for Auburn's volume foul shooting. The Tigers went 33-for-44.
"I don't know if that's the most free throws taken against my team, but it might be," said Calipari, who was a bit off. Kansas shot 47 free throws against the Cats on Jan. 30, 2016. North Carolina shot 45 on Dec. 14, 2013. "Let me just tell you, (Auburn) was putting its head down and go. We were trying to do the same but without the same result."
When Auburn drove and missed, the Tigers snatched the offensive rebound. Bruce Pearl's team collected 17 on the night, compared to 22 defensive rebounds for the Cats. That's an offensive rebounding percentage of 43.6 percent, which any hoops analytics expert will tell you is off the charts.
So while Saturday's loss was not a bad one _ especially considering it was the third leg of a gauntlet of successive Saturday road games that included Arkansas and Texas Tech _ it did shine the light on a particular UK flaw.
We're not used to that around here. Not with Calipari teams, previously known for flat-out attacking the glass. With the likes of Anthony Davis, Karl-Anthony Towns, Willie Cauley-Stein and Bam Adebayo, to name a few, Kentucky had often murdered teams on the boards, especially on the offensive boards.
This is not that team. Nick Richards has been by far this edition's most consistent rebounder, stacking double-doubles on top of double-doubles of late. But for whatever reason, the 7-foot junior could never find a rhythm Saturday against Auburn's 6-foot-11 center Austin Wiley. Richards finished with seven points and seven rebounds in 38 minutes.
That wouldn't have been so bad if Richards had received some help. Sadly, the cavalry never came. EJ Montgomery managed four rebounds in 17 minutes; Nate Sestina one in 18; Keion Brooks four in 22. Sophomore guard Immanuel Quickley was UK's second-leading rebounder with five before fouling out with under a minute to play.
When one of Tubby Smith's Kentucky teams was consistently pounding people on the boards, I made the mistake of asking then-UK AD C.M. Newton the reason. The former Alabama and Vanderbilt coach looked at me like I was crazy _ it wasn't the first or last time I got that look _ before talking about athleticism, effort and, yes, toughness.
And, as coincidence has it, just after giving up so many offensive rebounds to Auburn, Kentucky next faces the second-best offensive rebounding team in the country. That would be Mississippi State, which visits Rupp Arena for a 9 p.m. Super Tuesday matchup on ESPN.
Just when you were ready to write off Ben Howland, his Bulldogs have won five straight conference games, including an 86-73 thumping of Tennessee on Saturday in Starkville. And State's best player is 6-foot-10 Reggie Perry, a sophomore forward who drinks his milk straight from the carton. Perry is averaging 17.2 points and 10.0 rebounds per game.
"They push us around like we got pushed around today," Calipari said of the Bulldogs, "and it's going to be a hard one for us."
That's no yada, yada, yada.
