Pregame Florida talk from the Cats

Let's see what Cal and some of the Cats are saying ahead of their massive showdown with Florida tomorrow night... [via UK Athletics] Coach Cal

On if anything stood out to him after watching tape from the loss at Ole Miss … “Couple guys didn’t play very well. Like, really, I was stunned. What I’ve said to those players, it’s hard for me to watch individual performances when I’m watching a game. I’m trying to see the flow of the game; I’m trying to think ahead, I’m trying to see where I think this is going, what we need to do. It’s hard for me to zero in on one guy. When you do that on the tape you have the chance to rewind it, rewind it, rewind it, you’re like, ‘Uh-oh.’ We don’t have enough room for error, if two guys really play poorly, like, really play bad, we’re trying to play with 3.5 guys. So, guys have a responsibility to each other. We didn’t talk, we didn’t defend. We had a couple guys not defend at all; it was straight line drive, straight line drive to the basket. But Mississippi came out and they were the aggressor and that’s what happens.” On Florida … “Hard game. They’re playing well, they play well at home. Their two-guard will control the tempo of the game, their big kids are good, they run a lot of pick and rolls and do a lot of good stuff. Billy’s (Donovan) done a great job.” On if he believes Brandon Knight when he says that playing against Florida, a school that recruited him, and Kenny Boynton is just another game … “We’ll see, we will see. I hope he’s accurate with that statement because I think what they’ll try to do is press him a little bit, get up in him and do some stuff. He needs to have poise down there because the place will go nuts. It’ll be interesting. It’s a good game for us to play right now — great game.” Why? “Because it’s a bounce back game and you better bounce back, and you’re going to do it against another team and they’re not going to go away. So, you’re going to have to play the entire 40 minutes and we have to find out at some point this year when will we do it because we haven’t done it yet. We’ve played for 30 minutes and 32 minutes, we’ve not been close to a 40-minute game. So, this one, you better challenge yourself. You make a basket, you better not go back and say now I’m good and they score quickly. If you do that you have no chance of winning the game.”

Darius Miller

On the importance of starting well … “Yeah, it’s really important for me and the whole team. We can play a lot better, especially at the beginning of the games.” On the reaction to him not taking the final shot in the Ole Miss game … “I don’t know. It was just a bad moment I guess. But, I have to learn from it and move on.” On if he is lacking confidence … “No, I don’t think it really has anything to do with confidence. I think it just goes back to what I said earlier and I have to play the whole game.”

Brandon Knight

On the Florida game … “We are just trying to go out and do what we have been doing in the SEC.” On what it will be like to play in Florida … “The only thing I can say, and I will say is all I am trying to do is get wins. You know, I am focusing on the game plan and the things that we are going to have to deal with.” On teams trying to play Kentucky physically … “I’m not sure. Every team that we have played has tried to play us physical. It wasn’t just Ole Miss. Every team that we have played in the SEC has tried to play us more physical.”

And there you have it. The biggest game of the year is just over 24 h0urs away. Get ready and Go Big Blue.