The Kentucky Wildcats thrashed the South Carolina Gamecocks by a final score of 80-57 in Lexington on Saturday. It was Kentucky’s largest win of the SEC season.

This game was up and down from the start, and it wasn’t pretty for the majority of the first half. However, despite a very slow start, Kentucky found its rhythm. South Carolina did a good job of mucking things up, but an 11-0 run gave Kentucky its first lead, and a separate 14-3 run over the last six minutes of the first half allowed the Cats to take a 33-19 lead into the break.

In the second half, Kentucky extended its lead to 18, but the energy completely fell off, and they let the Gamecocks right back into the game. South Carolina cut it to a single-digit game with less than 10 minutes to go, but Kentucky dug deep to pull a 15-1 run out of a hat to finish it off for good.

Kentucky got a much-needed bounce-back win in this game. It wasn’t the prettiest game, but they showed a lot of positive signs for the future. And it keeps Kentucky in the hunt for a top-four seed in the NCAA Tournament and even the SEC Tournament.

Just what the doctor ordered.

Next up, the Tennessee Volunteers will travel to Lexington on Tuesday and attempt to avenge a home loss to the Cats just a couple of weeks ago.

Butler is back, but Robinson is hurt

The Cats have badly missed Lamont Butler, as he’s been out for the last three games. While that time included a road win over the Vols, this team just hasn’t been close to the same without him. And while Butler played prior to his absence, the injury clearly affected his play.

Luckily, Butler made his return in this one. His elite defense and ability to control the offense are so important for the Cats. He’s also the only one who you trust to consistently take his man off the dribble whenever he wants to.

Even though Kentucky’s defense hasn’t been great all season, it was significantly worse without Butler. What makes Butler’s absence hurt more is having Kerr Kriisa out, too. Travis Perry hasn’t been terrible, but he’s a year or two away from providing big minutes for Kentucky. It’s unknown when Kriisa will return, but having both point guards out really poured salt on the wound.

In Butler’s absence, Jaxson Robinson had been manning the point guard spot. He’s been terrific in the out-of-position role, but again, Kentucky is just better all-around with Butler in the game. Robinson was a better matchup against Zakai Ziegler, but that’s not usually going to be the case.

At the same time, Robinson has been dealing with injuries of his own. He had a hamstring injury followed by a recent wrist injury. He was actually questionable for this game and had to come out at one point solely due to the injury. He was writhing in pain and had to put some sort of splint on it. Robinson did return to the game, but it’s something to keep an eye on.

It’s good to have Butler back, but let’s hope the Cats just get healthy before it’s too late.

The bench made its presence felt

Kentucky’s bench has been hit or miss this season, but it hit today. Koby Brea, Andrew Carr, and Brandon Garrison all played extremely well. Trent Noah, while not providing much scoring, also gave Kentucky some good minutes and contributed in other ways.

Mark Pope really shortened the rotation, which was a long time coming. You could see the difference in this one as the best players played, and Perry and Collin Chandler weren’t forced into unnecessary action. It’ll probably be a give-and-take with the freshmen over the rest of the season, but all three can’t be playing big minutes, especially at the same time.

Brea has always been the microwave scorer off the bench, but he’s really struggled over the last several games, so it was nice to see him get back into a rhythm. Carr, meanwhile, looks healthy again and has probably worked himself back into the starting lineup. Finally, Garrison can’t play in every game because he’s a bit inconsistent and is matchup-dependent, but this game was the perfect matchup for him.

BG was under control offensively (a lot of dunks), and it’s always nice to see him step out and hit a three, although they’re sometimes ill-advised. Garrison’s biggest flaw is his inability to deal with physical play. He’s not a great rebounder, and despite his great size, he struggles defensively to get in a good position, block shots, and not get absolutely bullied under the basket.

However, he’s got to spell Amari Williams, and the offensive explosion was big time in this one.

The Cats CAN play defense!

We all know the Cats’ biggest issue this season has been defense, or the lack thereof. It’s been bad all year and it’s been significantly worse since Butler has been out.

However, Kentucky stepped it up on the defensive end in this game. It was probably their best showing of the season in that regard. While the results must be taken with a grain of salt due to the level of competition (South Carolina is really bad offensively), they held the Gamecocks to their lowest first-half point total (19) this season.

The energy fell off quite a bit in the second half as South Carolina hit the 20-point mark in less than 10 minutes after scoring just 19 in the entire first half. The good news is that Kentucky locked it down at that point and really pulled away as they got stop after stop—something we haven’t seen much of recently.

Now, we just have to hope that this turns into a trend going forward.

Go Cats!