2010-2011 Season Preview

I'm a little slow at work here, so allow me to give a breakdown of the 2010-2011 team.

Overall, I think we're going to struggle a lot more early on, and take some early losses, that we didn't take last year. Last year, we had a veteran verbal leader in Patterson, and got by a lot on pure talent.

We're going to be talented this year, but not as talented as last year. We won't have a John Wall or DeMarcus Cousins type talent, which will lose us some games early on.

However, I think by the end of the year, we're better built for a Final Four run than we were last year, mainly due to much better perimeter play.

My starting 5-

G- Brandon Knight- The only newcomer that I have seen play in person. He's a scorer. There's not much else I can say about him offensively. He's a threat to score from anywhere on the court. I don't know that he's a true point guard, though. I think he'd be better suited as a 2 guard. However, we don't have a true point guard on the team, so hopefully Calipari can work his magic with Knight and turn him into an elite point guard. He's not a "pass first" point guard like we saw with Wall. His passing needs improvement.

Expectation: 14 Points per game, 4.5 assists per game.

G- Daron Lamb- Based on the videos and reports I've read, Lamb is a very smart basketball player, who again is a threat to score from anywhere on the court. He's not the athletic freak like we saw out of Wall and Bledsoe last year, but he's a smarter player, and a better scorer. I expect us to run Lamb off a lot of screens and put him in a lot of catch and shoot situations.

Expectation: 13 Points per game, 2.5 assists per game


F- Darius Miller- 2nd year in Calipari's system. Showed spurts of being the scorer from the 3 spot that we lacked all of last year. I expect Miller to be a lot better in Year 2 of the system than he was in Year 1. Miller gets the nod for the starting spot at the 3 due to experience. Miller should step up and be the voice of this team. He's the upper classman with playing experience on this team. Time for Miller to step up and take over Patterson's role from last year. With a more balanced attack this year, expect Miller to get more open looks, and knock down some jumpshots.

Expectation: 9 Points per game, 5 Rebounds per game.


F- Terrence Jones- I think this is our best player on the team. I know Enes Kanter and Brandon Knight have gotten all the publicity so far, but I think that's just because Jones plays up there in Oregon, where no one sees him play much. The kid is going to be a match up problem for any team we play. A 6-9 power forward who can play on the perimeter is going to cause all sorts of problems for teams. If a team tries to put a 6-9 post player on him, Jones can draw them out away from the paint where a post player can't guard him. He's the best slasher in the 2010 class. His post play could use some improvement, but Jones has never been asked to be much of a post player, and he won't be asked to this year, either. However, if a team tries to put a 6'5 guard on him to counter Jones slashing ability, Jones will post them up, and just simply overpower them.

Expectation: 15 Points per game, 8 Rebounds per game


C- Enes Kanter- Big, strong, powerful player in the post. Can step out and knock down mid-range jumpshots. Kanter will be by far the best rebounder on this team, and will dominate any big man in the SEC. I am usually skeptical on foreign born big men, because they usually seem to try to play a Dirk Nowiski style of basketball, which hasn't worked very well for many foreign born players at the college level. However, Kanter is not a typical foreign born player. He's a powerful presence who isn't afraid to bang down low.

Expectation: 13 Points per game, 11 rebounds per game.


My first guys off the bench-

Stacey Poole- Another scorer to come off the bench. Probably a better scorer than Darius Miller. However, Miller is more of an outside threat than Poole. That coupled with the experience of Miller keeps Miller in the line-up, and Poole as the first one off the bench. Poole is going to be very important to this team, but I don't expect him to put up huge numbers, but I do expect him to be vitale to this teams success. He's the scorer off the bench that we lacked last year.

Expectations: 7 Points per game.

DeAndre Liggins- Not exactly a scoring threat, but a high energy guy to come off the bench and provide this team with a spark defensively. With all the scorers this team is going to be loaded with, I expect Liggins to play a vital role for this team defensively. His defensive intensity should earn him a lot of playing time.

Expectations: 5 Points per game, great defensive presence.


Eloy Vargas- Vargas gives us our only real depth in the post. His performance this year, will be key to how far this team can go. He's long and plays fundemental basketball. He's also a force on the defensive end of the court. Kentucky fans should not expect Vargas to contribute much on the offensive end of the court, but Vargas will fill the role played by Daniel Orton last year.

Expectations: 4 Points per game. 3 Rebounds per game. 1.5 blocked shots per game.


Darnell Dodson- Playing time will go down significantly for Dodson this year. He'll be playing behind Miller and Poole at the 3 spot, with the possibility of Liggins getting some time at the 3 spot ahead of him. I don't expect much out of Dodson this year. But, as he showed last year, he can be very streaky. If he gets into a game, and get's hot, he has the ability to light it up. However, I just don't see him playing much.

Expectations: 3 points per game.

The rest-

Jon Hood, Josh Harrellson, and Jarod Polson are all guys who will only play in Exhibition games, and during blowouts. These guys will not play much of a role for this team.


Just like last year, there's a lot of question marks with this team. However, I think we're built for the NCAA Tournament. We aren't going to run into a 1-3-1 zone this year, that we can't shoot over the top of. If this group of freshman gel like last years group of freshman did, this team has title hopes. A lot has to go right to win a National Title, but this will be one of the teams in contention come March.


Overall expectations- 25+ wins. Not sure how many games we'll play this year, so I can't give a record, but 25+ wins is a reasonable expectation.

2nd place in SEC East regular season. I buy the Florida hype. I think Florida is going to win the SEC East this year. By the end of the year, we will be a better team than Florida, but we are going to take a few lumps in SEC play early, that Florida will not.

SEC tournament champions. I think by the end of the year, we'll be easily the best team in the SEC, so we should win the SEC tournament.

#2 seed in NCAA tournament. Early losses keep us from getting a 1 seed, but I think we'll be the first or second 2 seed.