Voltar
Big Blue Nation currently has a ton of frustration with Mark Pope and this Kentucky basketball team, and with the showing on Tuesday night, they have every right to feel this way. This was an embarrassing 20-point loss for the Wildcats, and the college basketball world is questioning whether or not his team is going to be competitive.
One of the frustrations from this game for Kentucky fans was the fact that the superstar shooter for the Wildcats, Milan Momcilovic, only shot the basketball seven times, and only three of those shots were from beyond the arc. There is no better shooter in college basketball, and Coach Pope has to find a way to get him more looks.
Coach Pope agrees, as after the game he had this to say about Momcilovic: "We've got to be more creative to find ways to get him shots." I have seen a lot of the fan base only blaming Coach Pope for Momcilovic only having three shots from deep, but the veteran shooter should also receive some of the blame.
It was very clear that Coach Bill Self and the Jayhawks were going out of their way to make sure that Momcilovic didn't have a big day, and they succeeded at this. Momcilovic needs to find a way to get shots up with shot fakes. BBN knows that Momcilovic isn't the best athlete on the floor, so he needs to use shot fakes to try and get flybys.
One former Wildcat who was really good at this was the sharpshooter on Pope's first Kentucky team, Koby Brea. I do agree that Coach Pope needs to do more to help scheme things open for Momcilovic. At the same time, Momcilovic is such a good shooter that frankly, I'd be fine if he was taking some contested threes as long as he is getting his shots up.
The Wildcats reportedly paid Momcilovic over six million dollars to come be the superstar for this team. He did not look like that on Tuesday night in Chicago and the staff has to find a way to fix this. This is one thing that I do believe the staff will be able to fix because it isn't that hard to make Momcilovic shine. The next big game for the Wildcats is on November 20th against Indiana, and Kentucky needs to make sure that Momcilovic is getting some good looks in this game,
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