Kentucky has to ditch the Thanksgiving-quality snooze to start games

It is tough to write something less than positive following a 50-point win. Even thinking negative thoughts shoots a spark of guilt down my extremely basketball-spoiled spine. But this is Kentucky. This is what we do. So, in true holiday fashion, let’s gripe around our virtual dinner table about a controversial topic. Specifically, I am talking about the frustrating trend this Kentucky team has shown in taking a Thanksgiving-style nap in the first half of basketball games.

The Wildcats’ game against Tennessee Tech was my first game in person this season, and one of the main things I wanted to soak up was the vibe. All the vibes. From players, to coaches, to fans, how was the energy in the building?

Spoiler alert: it wasn’t great.

It is hard to get up for games with 38.5 spreads, but Mom has served the same Thanksgiving spread for my entire life, and I still get stoked. Do I love her cranberry salad? Not really, but do I come in hot on the last Thursday of every November to gobble it up with a genuine smile on my face? Absolutely.

Kentucky has to find a way to be hungrier earlier

As tough as it is to be critical, it is even more challenging to articulate bad vibes. Is it body language? Kind of. Is it a lack of chatter between players? Also, kind of. Is it a half-hearted effort? Yes, but it is more than that. Even in warm-ups, there just seemed to be a groggy energy in the arena.

Several players have admitted to literally taking a nap as part of their pre-game routine, and while I’m sure this doesn’t happen on a locker room cot, some of them don’t appear to be fully awake at tipoff.

For a coach so analytically driven, Mark Pope’s players do a lot of standing around, especially early. Whether it was on defense or offense, several times Kentucky players looked like they were watching the Thanksgiving NFL game with eyelids half-open, instead of being aggressive in an actual basketball game.

When they get down big, or in the case against Tennessee Tech, tied far too late in the game, these guys kick it into another gear to get to their Jenga moment, but they have to figure out how to get hungrier earlier.

There are a few exceptions

Not every player gives off this sleepy energy. The biggest pop of the game (aside from Walker Horn’s 3) came in the first half when Collin Chandler caught a body with a two-handed slam. If the play hadn’t occurred during a time in the game when there was an overall lull, the roof may have come off.

The second loudest moment in the first half came when Malachi Moreno dove for a ball out of bounds. He didn’t get it, but the crowd noticed his hustle and let their appreciation for it be known, almost as if they were willing additional energy into the building.

Ultimately, the whole team has to figure this out. Even if the ball isn’t bouncing their way, as Trent Noah put it (who, to be fair, played hard throughout), there is no reason the score should be tied at 25 with less than six minutes remaining in the first half against a team that they subsequently went on a 81-29 run against.

Against tougher competition at Louisville and versus Michigan State, Kentucky fell down double digits in the first half and never recovered. With North Carolina and Gonzaga looming, slow starts cannot continue if this team wants to live up to those Christmas-morning expectations we all had after the Purdue exhibition win.

Tryptophan is the ingredient in turkey that makes people sleepy, but Kentucky has to find a way to stop tripping over its own feet to start games. It will be a late tip on Tuesday against the Tar Heels; hopefully, everyone will be awake from their pregame Thanksgiving-quality naps by then.