Not Jerry Tipton's Friday Basketball Notebook

The 2013-14 season is here, and Kentucky will spend the entirety of it trying to atone for the disaster was the 2012-13 season. John Calipari’s team is trying to do something that no team in the history of college basketball has ever done: Win a national championship relying primarily on 6 freshmen who were McDonald’s All Americans. With disappointing losses to a whole bunch of teams, the team will fail to reach its ultimate goal of perfect season, and will instead try to console itself with a national title. To stay apprised and educated, follow me on Twitter @NotJerryTipton. Here’s the weekly notebook: *A Bad Goodbye (Feat. Wynonna Judd): Near the end of the UK-LSU game, Tigers guard and Kentucky native Anthony Hickey fouled out. In a shocking turn of events, Kentucky fans gave him a standing ovation. Make no mistake, however, UK fans were not applauding Hickey’s 20 points. Nor were they applauding his gutsy performance or the fact that he made big play after big play to keep LSU in the same. No, the real reason Cat fans applauded him was obvious: they are furious that John Calipari didn’t recruit Anthony Hickey, and they wanted to let Coach Cal know it. It isn’t often that a head coach is drowned in derisive and mean-spirited cheers from the home crowd, but that’s exactly what happened Saturday. Calipari even commented on this during his postgame show, saying that he was “impressed” that the fans cheered Hickey. Sarcastic much? *State of Mind: A recent “Bleacher Report” article written by Jason King painted this particular group of Kiddie Cats as stoic, business minded and quiet. Come March, these personality traits will likely be UK’s undoing. In order to make a serious run in the NCAA Tournament, a team must display passion, enthusiasm and emotion. This group of stone-faced automatons reveals none of these traits, and figures to be overwhelmed and outworked in the Big Dance by any team that is more excitable, even if they are less talented. Coach Cal frequently tells his players “I can’t hide you.” But with this group of wallflowers, he doesn’t have to worry about that. They do a great job of hiding themselves. *A Better Man: After UK edged LSU on a fluky last second shot by Julius Randle, the players celebrated as if they had just won the national championship on a last second shot. This does not bode well for Kentucky. By displaying this amount of emotion during a regular season game after failing to cover the spread by 9 points, the Cats revealed themselves to be just ordinary, excitable teenagers happy to be playing the game that they love. Come March, these personality traits will likely be UK’s undoing. In order to make a serious run in the NCAA Tournament, a team must be business-minded, and avoid the temptation to give in to the emotional ups and downs like the ones that accompany a closely fought contest such as what was witnessed in that game. This group of Kiddie Cats acted as if they’d never won a big game on a last second shot before where the opponent played its best game of the year. Unless something changes, they figure to be overwhelmed and outworked in the Big Dance by any team that is more stoic, business minded and quiet, even if they are less talented. * On this date: On this date in 2013, Indiana was ranked #1, had two top 4 NBA draft picks, and surely to goodness thought they could get past the Sweet 16.