BTO’s Kentucky Postgame Report

Only thing I will disagree with you on is I don’t think he was trying to be the voice of reason lol. That post was clearly meant to try and antagonize. He straight up said he didn’t think Tennessee would be good at all if we didn’t have Knecht, as if he has conveniently forgotten that Knecht was mostly MIA in Rupp and ZZ and JJJ were the two that buried them with 26 points each. Pretty easy to say “Geez, if you all didn’t have your All-American player, you would suck!” I highly doubt Kentucky is anywhere near as good as they are right now if you remove Reeves from that team.
Not to mention that this team beat Duke to make it to the Sweet 16 without Knecht and without ZZ last year.
 
One thing to keep in mind about Kentucky fans...they care WAY more about Tennessee than we care about them. That's not to say that we don't care about Kentucky or consider them a rival, but we've always focused more on Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and even Vanderbilt. Growing up in the 80s, Auburn was my 2nd most hated. I like the Kentucky rivalry, but it's down the list.

Our historic rivalries are informed by football (as is the case with most schools in most states). So Kentucky's historic greatness in basketball carries less weight than a football power. Until my sister went to UK and married a UK alum, I had no idea the hatred was so strong. They HATE Tennessee. I was like, dude, chill. You're just Kentucky. I never spent much energy hating UK because they were a sad little football program that had to settle for being good in basketball. To my BIL's credit, he and his friends will admit it. They hate us because we've always dominated them in football and been able to beat them more regularly than anyone else in basketball over the years. Plus, they don't border another SEC state.

So yeah, they're going to obsess over Tennessee and when they win (and more when they lose). It's a huge deal. Then they'll go on Twitter and tell us "We're your Super Bowl!" without intending the irony of it.
 
One thing to keep in mind about Kentucky fans...they care WAY more about Tennessee than we care about them. That's not to say that we don't care about Kentucky or consider them a rival, but we've always focused more on Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and even Vanderbilt. Growing up in the 80s, Auburn was my 2nd most hated. I like the Kentucky rivalry, but it's down the list.

Our historic rivalries are informed by football (as is the case with most schools in most states). So Kentucky's historic greatness in basketball carries less weight than a football power. Until my sister went to UK and married a UK alum, I had no idea the hatred was so strong. They HATE Tennessee. I was like, dude, chill. You're just Kentucky. I never spent much energy hating UK because they were a sad little football program that had to settle for being good in basketball. To my BIL's credit, he and his friends will admit it. They hate us because we've always dominated them in football and been able to beat them more regularly than anyone else in basketball over the years. Plus, they don't border another SEC state.

So yeah, they're going to obsess over Tennessee and when they win (and more when they lose). It's a huge deal. Then they'll go on Twitter and tell us "We're your Super Bowl!" without intending the irony of it.
This is true in football, but probably a far cry from reality in basketball. I’ve seen tons of posts here in the last week, openly saying our season success is defined by how we play against UK. I can promise you they do not feel that way about us in basketball.
 
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This is true in football, but probably a far cry from reality in basketball. I’ve seen tons of posts here in the last week, openly saying our season success is defined by how we play against UK. I can promise you they do not feel that way about us in basketball.
Yeah I would tend to agree with this. KY is the winningest college basketball program of all time. They seem to obsess way more about being #1 in wins and catching UCLA for national titles (they are second). They consider Louisville their biggest rival and they really hate Duke. In football, we are definitely their Super Bowl and I really don’t care much about playing them on the gridiron because I just expect the win. But in basketball, if I am being honest, I want to beat UK every year more than any other team and I’ve felt that way as long as I can remember.
 
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This is true in football, but probably a far cry from reality in basketball. I’ve seen tons of posts here in the last week, openly saying our season success is defined by how we play against UK. I can promise you they do not feel that way about us in basketball.
But did you run to the Kensucky board and post gloatingly, 10 or 12 times, tacking on as many little snipes as possible, when we beat them by 20 at their place this year? All the while, insisting to their board that you are "Mr Objectivity" and any KY fan who doesn't see that is blinded by their bias. That's the difference that launched this conversation.
 
Yeah I would tend to agree with this. KY is the winningest college basketball program of all time. They seem to obsess way more about being #1 in wins and catching UCLA for national titles (they are second). They consider Louisville their biggest rival and they really hate Duke. In football, we are definitely their Super Bowl and I really don’t care much about playing them on the gridiron because I just expect the win. But in basketball, if I am being honest, I want to beat UK every year more than any other team and I’ve felt that way as long as I can remember.
Louisville isn’t worth worrying about at the moment so we might rank as their biggest rival. We’ve definitely won more conference titles and head-to-head matchups the last few years and they seem to feel some kinda way about not being head and shoulders above the rest of the league anymore.
 
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But did you run to the Kensucky board and post gloatingly, 10 or 12 times, tacking on as many little snipes as possible, when we beat them by 20 at their place this year? All the while, insisting to their board that you are "Mr Objectivity" and any KY fan who doesn't see that is blinded by their bias. That's the difference that launched this conversation

How did I gloat 10 or 12 times?

You want to cry over 1 post where I said UT would have been screwed without DK, which is something a lot of UT fans have already said. You are such a clown making up imaginary issues.

I have zero desire to gloat, and even if I did, I wouldn't. UT is the better team, Barnes is the better coach, and in all honesty I don't expect much from this UK team in the tourney. I believe UT is far more likely to make a deep run. As inconsistent as the offense can be, the experience will help a lot.

Stop trying to make me some type of villain. You are so sensitive.
 
I think that was a game where Nkahmoua went off? Would have been nice to have him back. I don't remember the story as to why he left.

He left simply because he had reached his ceiling here and I believe Barnes was looking for a change in direction. He was every bit as inconsistent as some of the current players on this team, but his departure opened the door for transfer additions and for more playing time for Awaka and Aidoo as ORN played a lot of 4/5 as one of our few experienced bigs last year. He also didn’t rebound at the rate you would expect him to as well.

I don’t think his presence would have helped this team much.
 
I think that was a game where Nkahmoua went off? Would have been nice to have him back. I don't remember the story as to why he left.

He was a senior and there wasn’t a spot for him so he chose Michigan over walking on at UT for his optional COVID year. UT wasn’t going to hold a scholarship for him in case he didn’t go play in Europe.
 
He left simply because he had reached his ceiling here and I believe Barnes was looking for a change in direction. He was every bit as inconsistent as some of the current players on this team, but his departure opened the door for transfer additions and for more playing time for Awaka and Aidoo as ORN played a lot of 4/5 as one of our few experienced bigs last year. He also didn’t rebound at the rate you would expect him to as well.

I don’t think his presence would have helped this team much.

I didn't get to watch many games last year. I remember the games I watched he always seemed to be pretty good. Totally didn't realize he went to Michigan
 
I didn't get to watch many games last year. I remember the games I watched he always seemed to be pretty good. Totally didn't realize he went to Michigan

He was fine. He had some big games, but for every game he scored 20+ there were 4 games he would score like 4 points. His departure has opened up new opportunities for some younger guys. If he was still here, I’m not sure if JJJ returns or if Aidoo develops like he has this year.
 
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This is true in football, but probably a far cry from reality in basketball. I’ve seen tons of posts here in the last week, openly saying our season success is defined by how we play against UK. I can promise you they do not feel that way about us in basketball.
I’m simply referring to overall, not a particular sport. As I said, our rivals are more defined by football. Kentucky is Tennessee’s biggest basketball rival. But it’s basketball. And for most schools, basketball plays 2nd fiddle to football.
 

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