KSR's top takeaways from Kentucky's 64-58 road win at Texas A&M

It wasn’t pretty, but the Kentucky Wildcats got it done, beating Texas A&M in College Station by a final score of 64-58. It was a win that moved UK to 15-3 on the year and 5-1 in conference play, good for second in the SEC.

How did it all come together? And what does it mean for the Wildcats as they look ahead to their matchup at Auburn on Saturday?

Kentucky’s first close win of the year

In UK’s first 14 wins of the season, all came in double-digit fashion, with 12 points being the closest margin of victory. The team’s three losses, however, were all single-digit deficits. When the Wildcats won, they won big. In tight matchups down the stretch, they lost, all away from home.

This time around, though, Kentucky managed to win its first rock fight of the year, taking down Texas A&M by six points on the road. The Wildcats overcame a cold shooting night — 36.2 percent from the field and 22.2 percent from three — to hold off the Aggies.

“You’ve got to give them credit for how they played us,” John Calipari said after the win. “They came in with a game plan, and it affected us.”

It was the first time in the Calipari era a Kentucky team shot worse than 40 percent from the field and 25 percent from three while committing at least 15 turnovers in a true road game. Even still, the Wildcats made the plays that mattered most down the stretch and pulled off the win.

A rough start in College Station

Kentucky crawled out of the gate in a hostile road environment, with the Wildcats clearly shaken up by the crowd noise and defensive pressure applied by the Aggies. With just 5:57 to go in the first half, Kentucky found itself down by a game-high 13 points with momentum completely on A&M’s side.

Rather than letting go of the rope, though, UK closed the half hitting four straight field goals to cut the lead to just five in the final seconds. It was a quick 8-2 run that gave the Wildcats a real shot to secure the comeback after intermission.

The late momentum would continue to open the second half, as Kentucky jumped out to a quick 5-0 run in 1:26 to tie things up at 35-35. From there, it was a brand new ballgame for both teams.

Sahvir Wheeler with a career-high eight turnovers

Did Wheeler help or hurt the Wildcats on Wednesday? Both is an acceptable answer. On one end, the junior point guard led the team in scoring with 12 points on 5-8 shooting and 2-2 from three to go with four assists and one steal. He knocked down open shots and sliced through defenders for impressive finishes at the rim in the half-court, including the layup at the buzzer to cut it to five before half and then the 3-pointer to tie it early in the second.

That’s the good. The bad, however, is that Wheeler finished the day with a career-high eight turnovers in 31 minutes, killing the team at times with sloppy ball-handling and errant passes. The junior point guard tried to do too much and it hurt the Wildcats, plain and simple.

As a team, the Wildcats finished with 17 total turnovers, with two coming from TyTy Washington, Davion Mintz and Oscar Tshiebwe each.

A&M shoots 1-22 from three

Kentucky shot poorly, but Texas A&M was nearly just as bad overall and even worse — way worse — from three and the free-throw line. As a team, the Aggies finished shooting 39.4 percent from the field, 4.5 percent from three and 38.5 percent from the line.

That 4.5-percent mark (1-22) from deep is A&M’s second-lowest percent in a game since joining the SEC in 2012-13.

Hassan Diarra was the only Aggie with a make from deep on Wednesday, though he shot 2-7 from the field overall and 1-5 from three. Everyone else combined for zero makes on 17 attempts from deep.

Jacob Toppin provides energy in the second half

Calipari started the game with Keion Brooks Jr., but finished the night with Jacob Toppin, who put forth a brilliant all-around performance in the win. The 6-foot-9 forward finished the day with nine points on 3-6 shooting, 3-4 from the line, six rebounds, two assists, one block, one steal. In the second half alone, Toppin added seven points on 2-4 shooting and 3-4 from the line to go with three rebounds, one block and one steal.

Overall, he was terrific on defense, guarding in the post and out on the perimeter. He said after the game he was comfortable guarding all five positions on the floor, and he showed that in tonight’s win.

“Whoever coach needs me to guard, I’m going to guard, and I’m going to do it with pride,” Toppin said after the game. “I take pride in my defense. Whoever is in front of me, I’m going to try my hardest to stop them.”

Big shots for TyTy Washington late

Washington has been phenomenal for the Wildcats all season long, particularly as a go-to scorer and more recently as a facilitator. The only real knock on his freshman campaign has been his lack of production on the big stage.

His three worst performances of the year have all come in Kentucky’s losses this season. He started with a nine-point effort against Duke on 3-14 shooting in 28 minutes, followed by six points on 3-7 shooting in 33 minutes at Notre Dame and five points on 2-9 shooting in 33 minutes at LSU.

Tonight, Washington was on his way to another underwhelming performance in the spotlight, starting the day with two quick fouls in the first five minutes before finishing the first half with just two points on 1-4 shooting.

After coming out of the break a bit slow, Washington finally knocked down one midrange jumper with 4:48 to go to give Kentucky a four-point lead, their largest of the game at that time. He then hit another to push the UK lead back up to four with 3:38 remaining, giving the Wildcats a much-needed cushion down the stretch.

His final stats won’t jump off the page, finishing with eight points on 3-10 shooting to go with four rebounds, one assist, one steal and two turnovers. In that moment, though, the late shots were huge.

Kellan Grady comes up limping

Kentucky won’t head back to Lexington unscathed, as graduate transfer guard Kellan Grady was forced to exit the game with a leg injury late in the second half.

With 5:31 to go, Grady came up limping and was taken to the locker room for evaluation with trainers. He came back to the bench a few minutes later and ultimately re-entered the game with 2:25 remaining. After attempting to run up and down the floor on a few possessions, Grady exited again, this time for good with 1:25 to go.

After the game, Calipari didn’t address his standout guard’s injury status moving forward or availability for Kentucky’s trip to Auburn on Saturday.

Grady finished the day with five points on 2-10 shooting and 1-9 from three to go with three rebounds and one assist in a team-high 35 minutes.