J.D. Hall 
Kentucky opens season with big win over Wright State.
Monday night was the official start of the Mark Pope era at Kentucky. It kicked off with a 103-62
win against Wright State, the most points in a season opener since November 11, 2011 against Marist
(108). Things got off to an exciting start with a big-to-big lob for a dunk from Amari Williams to Andrew
Carr. It would be the first of 3 assists for Williams on the night to go with 12 points and 13 rebounds.
Williams wasn’t the only one to have a big night. Otega Oweh led Kentucky with 21 points going
3-3 from deep and adding 3 rebounds, 3 steals and a block. Kobe Brea also snapped out of his exhibition
funk going 7-8 from the floor, including 4-4 from 3, for 18 points. They were joined by 3 others in double
digits; Lamont Butler (14), Carr (11) and Ansley Almonor (11).
After shooting an absurd 79 3s in the 2 exhibition games, Kentucky only got off 9 in the first half,
making 4. Wright State came out aggressively defending the 3 point line and it led to many easy layups
off rolls and back cuts for the Cats. The 2 nd half would be closer to what we should see most of the
season, with Kentucky going 7-15 from 3 in the half.
Jaxson Robinson got off to a good start in the first half with 2 early 3s and 8 points, but those
would be the only points he would score on the night. He was able to impact the game in his time on the
floor in other ways, coming up with 5 rebounds and 3 assists in only 21 minutes.
Wright State was led by Brandon Noel with 20 points and 8 rebounds. They would put two
others in double digit scoring with Alex Huibregtse with 16 points and Solomon Callaghan with 15. Those
were the bright spots for Wright State. Not only was Kentucky humming on offense, Wright State
wouldn’t get anything easy on their end of the floor. Kentucky would hold them to 35.3% from the floor
overall and only 18.5% from behind the arc.
There will be some things Kentucky will need to work on coming out of this game, namely
rebounding. Kentucky only had 7 offensive rebounds but gave up 11. A lot of those were due to long
rebounds from 3 with Kentucky players leaking out on the break, but that’s something to focus on going
forward.
All in all it was a great start for Kentucky to kick off Mark Pope’s time leading Kentucky. What
made the game’s score even more memorable, they would win with a final margin of 41 points and
Pope wore 41 in his time at Kentucky. It couldn’t have been scripted better to start!
Kentucky returns to the floor Saturday with a game against Bucknell at 4:00pm EST on
SECN+/ESPN+.
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