Some will say, same old, same old. No. 17 Kentucky faced its first real test of the college basketball season Tuesday night and stumbled late, falling 89-84 to No. 1 Kansas. And yet, if most of Big Blue Nation came away encouraged instead of angry, there’d be good reasons. So, a quick review of how Kentucky lost.

Kentucky:

  • a) Started the game down 9-0.
  • b) Shot 33% for the game.
  • c) Was both outrebounded and shot fewer free throws than Kansas.
  • d) Was without all 3 rostered players taller than 6-9.
  • e) Got a combined 1-for-18 shooting from highly touted freshmen Justin Edwards and DJ Wagner.
  • f) Blew a double-digit lead in the 2nd half
  • g) All of the above.

To steal from SDS’ Connor O’Gara, the answer is always all of the above.

Given those factors — for that matter, given even 2 or 3 of those factors — it would boggle the collective mind of Big Blue Nation to know that UK hoisted a shot to tie the game in the final 10 seconds. Sure, Reed Sheppard’s ill-advised heave was an air ball, but a Kentucky team well on the upward side of its learning curve gave veteran Kansas absolutely all it could handle.

So given the laundry list of struggles above, how did Kentucky compete? Well, while hyped freshmen Wagner and Edwards were frankly awful, less hyped freshmen Rob Dillingham and Sheppard had absolute moments of hoops genius. Dillingham connected on 4 3-pointers in 121 seconds late in the first half, turning a 4-point Kentucky deficit into a 3-point lead. Perhaps even more impressive, on the next possession, Dillingham had the ball on the wing and could have fired a 5th trey. He instead feathered a pass to Antonio Reeves, who hit yet another 3. Dillingham finished with 18 points. He also fouled out in just 16 minutes of play and contributed both an awful defensive decision that led to a Kansas 3 and an air ball to the closing minutes.

Sheppard added 13 points and 4 steals. He didn’t miss a shot until his last-second heave. He also was bedeviled by foul trouble and had a couple costly turnovers. Don’t forget sophomore Adou Thiero, who was truly unheralded as an 11th-hour recruiting addition, but has grown into an athletic 6-8 utility player, who managed 16 points and 13 boards despite being outsized in the post. Senior guard Antonio Reeves added 24 points, although he did shoot an ugly 7-for-25, including 3-for-17 from 3-point range.

Mostly, Kentucky scrapped on Tuesday night. Despite giving up size to both Hunter Dickinson and KJ Adams, Thiero and fellow undersized pseudo-post player Tre Mitchell held their own. The mind boggles at how helpful centers Aaron Bradshaw or Ugonna Onyenso would have been. Despite awful shooting games from Edwards (1-for-12) and Wagner, Dillingham and Sheppard competed with Kansas’s highly decorated backcourt … although a hand in the face of Kansas’s cooler than cool Dajuan Harris (who shot 5-for-6 from downtown en route to 23 points) would have helped.

There will still be some who will find the negative in this game — that Kentucky blew a 12-point first half lead, a 14-point second half lead, or even a 6-point edge with 3:46 to play.

They’ll miss the point.

Kansas, a veteran and talented team, played its A game Tuesday night. A short-handed and wildly inexperienced Kentucky team simply did not. For guys like Wagner and Edwards, this probably wasn’t even their C- game. And yet, Kentucky implausibly found a way to compete. Wagner and Edwards won’t shoot 6% this season. Dillingham will learn a few finer points of defense, and Sheppard can conquer late-game strategy. And don’t forget the 3 7-foot standouts who are all working closer to game-ready.

Was Kentucky back at the top of the college hoops heap on Tuesday? Not quite. But it wasn’t at all hard to see how they can be — and maybe even how they will be.