No. 17 Kentucky has won three of its past four games, partially due to an improvement on the defensive end of the floor. The Cats have made adjustments and improvements recently and the results are showing on the court.

UK head coach Mark Pope has seen his team improve lately despite currently missing two of its best defenders, Lamont Butler and Jaxson Robinson.

“Over the last five games, I’m really proud of what we’ve done,” Pope said. “After Ole Miss, we were sitting there at 112^th defensive team in the country and we’ve jumped to 68. That’s a massive jump and it’s been a real commitment by our guys over the last five games. Over the last five games, we’ve had the 13^th-best defense in the country. That’s not somewhere we have lived most of the season.”

Pope knows the reasons for the Cats’ improvement at the defensive end.

“That comes from a few things,” Pope said. “One is guys really dialing in to a more cohesvive kind of team-oriented functioning defense. More importantly, it’s guys taking it really, really personally. It’s been a lot of things. It’s been us being more effective on the defensive glass, us guarding without fouling, us protecting the box. It’s been step-by-step as we’ve gone through the last several weeks and we’re really proud of the progress.”

Pope knows that, if Kentucky is to make any type of postseason run, playing good defense is imperative.

“It’s incredibly important,” he said. “We need to keep growing and improving if we’re going to be the team that we’d like to be as we go into the postseason.”

The newly-improved UK defense will be put to a serious test on Saturday as the Cats visit No. 4 Alabama at Coleman Coliseum. The Crimson Tide lead the nation in scoring, averaging 90.6 points per game. In the first contest between the two teams, Alabama scored 102 points, beating the Cats in Rupp Arena. Pope knows how good the Tide are offensively.

“Alabama is a whole new situation,” he said. “They are one of, if not the most explosive offensive team in the country. They challenge you in so many different ways. Alabama poses the biggest challenge defensively that we will probably face this season.”

Kentucky’s defense is much improved lately, but the Cats will get a really big test on Saturday against the high-scoring Crimson Tide.