Final Exhibition: Morehouse at Kentucky

John Calipari’s Kentucky Wildcats will play their second and final tune-up game in tonight’s exhibition against Morehouse at 7:00 p.m. at Rupp Arena.

The first exhibition wasn’t pretty, but Kentucky accomplished some things against Transylvania. However Cal made it clear that his team still have plenty to work on. Calipari told the world that freshman Michael Kidd-Gilchrist had to and would start this game. Kidd-Gilchrist seems to be Cailpari’s favorite player of the group so far as Cal has gone out of his way to commend Michael on his competitiveness and ability.

Kidd-Gilchrist’s emergence in the starting lineup means that Darius Miller will me relegated to the bench to start the game, and at least for tonight, be the sixth man. It seems that Calipari may be trying to send a message to Miller and light a fire under him, but others have tried that in the past and to no avail. Miller is one of the keys to this season, and if he doesn’t get things going early, he may see his minutes decrease as the season progresses.

Calipari definitely wants to see this team rebound the ball better. They’ve had practices this week that focused on rebounding the basketball and being tougher than their opponent. Kentucky was infinitely more talented than Transylvania last week, but Transy is a tough team and showed it.

Kentucky will also look to have more success in the post. They chucked up a lot of threes and jump shots in the first exhibition and guys like Anthony Davis and Terrence Jones did little in the post. Jones is the most capable post player on this team, and he’s proven that he’s capable of great things in there. But it would be great to see Davis become a great post player as well to compliment his skills on the perimeter. If he adds some post moves and toughness inside, he may never be stopped. He still needs to get stronger and more aggressive in the paint.

The Cats will also look to put together a full game of defense. After getting the jitters out in the first half, Kentucky put the clamp down against Transylvania. Tonight, they need to show they can defend for 40 minutes and not allow an inferior team to get ahead with a lead. Look for the pressure to increase tonight and for Kentucky to work on their press some more, something that Calipari has said they will implement more often this season.

I expect this game to go much more smooth that the first exhibition. You easily forget that a lot of these guys are just freshman and are playing in their first collegiate basketball games. The style that they are learning is much different than the one-on-one and running style of AAU basketball. Look for the to start settling in tonight and getting more comfortable with the offense and defense as the game moves along.