The Big Blue Lowdown

Kentucky defeated a much improved Indiana squad today 90-73, demonstrating an arsenal of offensive weapons and a lethal combination of speed, size and depth.

After receiving the bulk of the attention over the past few weeks, John Wall took a backseat to his supporting cast today, scoring only 11 points but adding 7 rebounds and 8 assists to only 1 turnover. Plus he had this gem (apologies for the poor quality):

But the true story today was UK’s ability to dominate the offensive glass and get the ball into the hands of a number of emerging playmakers. In all, five players scored in double figures, led by Eric Bledsoe, who dropped 23 points on 8 of 10 shooting. Bledsoe was particularly deadly from long range, going 4 for 5 from behind the three point arc.

Patrick Patterson also chipped in his customary 19 points and 11 rebounds, while demonstrating a face-up jumper that is beginning to look positively deadly.

All in all, Kentucky showed poise in its first true road game—Indiana’s fired up crowd held signs and chanted a number of derogatory digs at Calipari. Indiana also seemed to be withholding tickets from the Big Blue fanbase, which sent thousands of fans to New York earlier this week but could barely be heard in Bloomington’s Assembly Hall.

To withstand an early rally from IU, which jumped out to an 8 point lead, and steadily build an increasingly larger lead throughout the day shows that this team is improving game by game. UK just finished a tough 5 game stretch with victories over Stanford, North Carolina, UConn and Indiana, and it is plain to see that this team hasn’t played its best basketball yet.

The 10-0 start is Kentucky’s best since an 11-0 start in 1992-93.