LEXINGTON, Ky. — After Kentucky’s 71-68 loss to South Carolina, the only happy noise in Rupp Arena was the Gamecocks team whooping triumphantly into the locker room after a wire-to-wire win over the Wildcats. Certainly there was plenty of other noise on this night, but it was a very different kind. The grumbling kind. The “things have got to change” kind. The firing kind.

Before the SEC co-opted the slogan, college basketball at the University of Kentucky could be said to just mean more. More than in the rest of the SEC, certainly. Maybe more than in all but a handful of blue-blood programs in NCAA basketball. Which is why since the last 5 minutes of a Final Four game against Wisconsin in 2015, John Calipari’s tenure in Lexington has grown increasingly complicated.

Before Frank Kaminsky and his Badgers stole the mojo of Kentucky’s perfect season, Calipari and Kentucky looked like a match made in hoops heaven. In 6 seasons in Lexington, Calipari had delivered 4 Final Four teams, and the school’s 8th NCAA title. Yes, there had been hiccups. Like the John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins-led 2010 team getting knocked out in the NCAA Elite Eight. Or the 2014 team losing to an incredibly ho-hum UConn team after managing to sneak into the national championship game. But those were minor problems.

But sometime around the final minutes of that 2015 NCAA semifinal, a switch flipped. Since 2015, Calipari has still put together some quality teams. The 2017 Wildcats lost in the final seconds to North Carolina in the Elite Eight. UNC went on to win the NCAA title. The 2019 Wildcats went to overtime in the Elite Eight before falling to (gulp) Auburn and Bruce Pearl. But lately, the issues have been more substantive than a little bad luck and coming up a basket short.

The 2021 Wildcats went 9-16, the worst mark since 1989. The 2022 squad looked to rebound from that awkward COVID campaign, but one lackluster game in the NCAA Round of 64 against No. 15 seed St. Peter’s undid most of the goodwill of a 26-7 campaign up to that point.

Which made this season feel a little more important. With Big Blue Nation staring down the barrel of the “lifetime” contract which Calipari inked with UK in June 2019, National Player of the Year Oscar Tshiebwe elected to return to Lexington rather than pursue the NBA. Kentucky rolled through a summertime basketball trip to the Bahamas, showcasing depth, scoring punch, and plenty of talent. The Wildcats opened the season ranked No. 4 in the nation. Calipari had returned in force to the recruiting trail, eventually locking down what will be the No. 1 ranked recruiting class in the nation for next season.

But a funny thing happened in a season that seemed scripted to be a return to form. Kentucky has looked more like the hamstrung, punchless team that lost to St. Peter’s last March than the nation’s No. 4 squad. Losing to Michigan State in double overtime wasn’t shocking. Getting drubbed by 16 by Gonzaga might have been. But losing by 14 at Missouri? Ugly. Getting drilled by 26 at Alabama? Even worse. Then came Tuesday’s clunker — with South Carolina ending the Wildcats’ 28-game home winning streak.

Kentucky has struggled early in seasons before under Calipari. But those struggling teams were generally stocked with freshmen who were visibly adjusting to big-time college basketball. It’s a little different when veteran players are standing still or regressing.

Tshiebwe has showed flashes of last year’s form, but also had games like the matchup with Alabama, when he finished with 4 points on 1-for-7 shooting. Sahvir Wheeler always hustles but is inconsistent as a scorer. Jacob Toppin is another player who can score 20 points or 2 points on any given night. And Kentucky finds itself in mid-January without a Quad-1 NCAA win and with plenty of work to do, even to survive in SEC play.

Tuesday night, the Wildcats fell behind 7-8 South Carolina by a 13-2 score and were audibly booed by a less-than-impressed (and less than capacity) Rupp Arena crowd. It didn’t get much better, as the Wildcats never led and fell to 1-3 with a shocking 71-68 loss.

Afterward, Calipari said if fans wanted to be mad, they should be mad at him. Some fans didn’t wait that long to voice their opinion.

Kentucky has significant offense limitations. The Wildcats are visibly searching for a power forward. UK struggles to compete without Wheeler and Tshiebwe both on the floor. Both of Kentucky’s starting guards entered Tuesday shooting below 60% at the free throw line.

And the remedy for this problem, unlike teams that waited for the Harrison brothers or Brandon Knight or Julius Randle to grow up on the court, isn’t obvious.

There is little doubt that Calipari is increasingly becoming an abrasive presence for many members of the Big Blue Nation. Some of the very media savvy self-promotion that made Cal a good fit in Lexington can also grow tiring during a multi-season run without an NCAA Tournament victory. Calipari’s on-court inability to adjust to a perimeter-centric world has been a significant part of UK’s struggles. And for all the talk of tweaks and adjustments, Kentucky seems to be playing checkers while SEC compatriots like Alabama, Arkansas, and Tennessee have started playing chess. South Carolina hit 11 3-pointers on Tuesday. Kentucky made 3.

Is it time to pull the plug?

Let’s acknowledge the sobering truth.

No matter how awful the past 3 years of basketball under Calipari have been– and much of the time, they have been genuinely awful — the rest of the basketball world won’t see that. They’ll see UK’s fan base overreacting, expecting annual championships and running a Hall of Fame coach out of town.

While most Big Blue backers seem to expect that Jay Wright or Brad Stevens will come running, there would be some real hesitancy within the coaching fraternity to dive into the eternal hot seat in Lexington. Sure, Kentucky can throw plenty of money at the problem. Sure, there’s fan support and historical prestige. But coaches — more than most fans would like to believe — are friends. If Cal gets squeezed out, it will have ramifications in the ensuing coaching search.

And there is this: Remember that top-ranked recruiting class Calipari has coming to Lexington? DJ Wagner, Aaron Bradshaw and Justin Edwards (3 of the top 6 players in the class per 247sports.com) aren’t planning to head to Lexington to check out racehorses or bourbon. Those guys committed to Calipari, not to Kentucky. Fire Cal and be careful of whiplash from watching those guys race out the same door they strolled through.

Calipari probably has another year in Lexington, no matter how many awful losses the Wildcats stumble through this season. He’d be wise to steer clear of trying to reshape his program with transfers from Rhode Island, Illinois State, or Iowa. He’ll go back to what he came to Lexington to do — grab the best players in the country and help them grow up on the fly. Maybe that’ll work.

But on the other hand, can Kentucky afford another wasted season following off one that looks more likely to end in the NIT than in any sort of NCAA Tournament run? South Carolina basically had one highly-regarded player and a team full of guys who wouldn’t sniff playing time in Lexington. Didn’t exactly seem to matter in the end on Tuesday, particularly in the joyful visiting locker room.

Memories are short. Fans are fickle, particularly the kind who write big checks for new facilities and massive NIL donations. Kentucky’s position is untenable, and as hard as it was only a few years ago to imagine Kentucky basketball without John Calipari, it might soon be harder to imagine it continuing with him.

The remainder of this ugly season may well tell the tale. It definitely means more for Calipari, and Kentucky fans would welcome a happier type of noise.