As Kentucky prepared in the opening weeks of practice it became evident that the philosophy of basketball was going to be much different than what Big Blue Nation is used to. They were going to move the ball a lot, and they were going to shoot a lot of threes. In fact, Koby Brea told SEC Network reporters that Mark Pope wants to lead the nation in threes.

This became very apparent in their first exhibition game. They are going to shoot a lot of threes and score a lot of points. This is the plan and the philosophy of each and every game. Here’s how much Kentucky loves the three-ball.

When keeping track of three-point shots made on the court, they ran out of threes to display. They made 21 three-point shots out of 42 attempts. That’s a 50% rate and adds up to a whopping 63 points, more than half of their total of 123 points.

To put this in perspective, under John Calipari, Kentucky only ever made a grand total of 17 threes in a game. This game was an exhibition, so it doesn’t officially count, but 21 blows that number out of the water.

Kentucky actively played 11 players, and only two of them didn’t attempt a three-ball, Andrew Carr and Amari Williams. Everyone else (besides the couple minutes of Walker Horn) attempted a three. Only two of those nine players that threw up a three-point shot didn’t make one. Brandon Garrison and Collin Chandler. The players that led the way were Jaxson Robinson, who went 5/9 from behind the arch, and Ansley Almonor, who went 5/7.

Look at the shot chart and the breakdown of where Kentucky made and attempted shots.

Look at that display. It’s wild to see this as an image. Kentucky shot the ball 76 times, 42 of them from behind the three-point line. This means only 34 were inside of it, and of those 34, almost all were at the basket. There were only eight shots that could be considered outside of the hoop but below the three-point line. And only three of them were outside the key. Three shots outside the key! Three!

In one exhibition game, we can see how Kentucky basketball loves the three. Like the old playground used to say, “If you love it so much, why don’t you marry it?!” Kentucky had the ceremony against Kentucky Wesleyan. They have married the three-point shot.