(Doron Lamb knows Kentucky is the favorite. And he says it doesn’t add any pressure. NCAA.com’s Lee Feinswog details how the Wildcats and rival Louisville are mentally focusing on their Final Four matchup. Picture courtesy of NCAA)
(PhatzRadio / USA Today) — Kentucky coach John Calipari is a Pied Piper for recruiting.
He has a reputation for attracting some of the nation’s top players, who turned Memphis, where Calipari coached from 2000 to 2009, and now Kentucky into a pit stop on the way to the professional ranks.
His youth movement has been a resounding success. He had 29 wins last season en route to the Final Four and 35 in 2010-11. In 2008, Memphis reached the NCAA title game behind freshman Derrick Rose, who a few months later became the No. 1 pick in the NBA draft.
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The only blemish is the absence of an NCAA championship, but this team will be his first to get it.
A lineup stocked with future professionals will give the school its eighth national title and first since 1998. The school’s seven already rank second behind UCLA’s 11.
Freshman Anthony Davis, the expected No. 1 pick in the NBA draft in June, could own this Final Four similar to Carmelo Anthony in 2003. Anthony led Syracuse to the national title that year as a freshman before departing for the NBA.
Davis, 6-10, already has won the Oscar Robertson Trophy as national player of the year and averages 14.3 points, 10.1 rebounds and 4.6 blocked shots. He holds the Southeastern Conference season record with 175 blocks.
Or maybe freshman Michael Kidd-Gilchrist will continue his star turn. Kidd-Gilchrist was named the South Regional’s most outstanding player after scoring 24 against Indiana and 19 against Baylor.
The list of scorers goes on and on. Seven players have led the team in scoring, and six average double figures. Sophomores Terrence Jones and Doron Lamb as well as senior Darius Miller played in last season’s national semifinal loss to Connecticut. That experience, whether it’s playing on a raised floor or in front of 70,000 fans, should help.
Kentucky is on the verge of a title because its young elite athletes, including freshman point guard Marquis Teague, play as though they have been together for years.
“People ask me if it’s hard to get those players to play together,” Calipari says. “I tell them what’s hard is coaching bad players.”
He is being flip or forgetting that he assembled a tremendously talented group last season that fell a little short.
This one is different because of the cohesion, their consistency and a defensive anchor in Anthony, who patrols the paint, altering shots if not swatting them.
The team’s defensive stops are dramatic and fuel the offense. The Wildcats lead Division I in field goal percentage defense, forcing opponents to shoot 37.5%.
“We are a young team that has done it on both ends of the floor,” Calipari says. “They are about team, not about themselves.”
It’s rare for a young team, even one as talented as this, to put it all together in the course of a season, but Kentucky is pulling it off. The Wildcats have won every tournament game by double digits.
The idea has been floated that Kentucky could beat an NBA team. That’s a big stretch, according to Calipari.
Especially since winning the NCAA tournament will do.
