Tuesday started out as a good day in Bluegrass Country with the Kentucky Wildcats enjoying the spoils that come with being the #1 ranked team in college basketball for the first time since 2003. The entire team even got to have a conference call prior to the game with President Obama because the team raised over $1 million dollars for Haiti relief aid.
As if we haven’t seen enough coverage of the John Wall Lottery Sweepstakes, virtually every basketball site on the web was posting stories on when and if Kentucky was going to finally lose a game. Many even warned that Indiana’s perfect season, more than 30 years ago, could be in jeopardy.
Before the Wildcats game with SEC rival South Carolina, the Gamecocks pint sized prolific scorer, Devan Downey, apparently wasn’t buying into all of the hype that Big Blue was the second coming of Bob Knight’s Hoosiers of the late 70’s. In the pre-game presser, he made some rather bold statements and predictions which everyone just shrugged off as Devan being Devan, where the oft outspoken point guard sometimes spouts off at the mouth in a bragadocious manor.
Downey surprised everyone by proclaiming that John Wall wouldn’t even be the best point guard on the floor and that the Gamecocks were going to shock the world by defeating the Wildcats on national TV.
Downey’s game has been just as sparkling as his mouth lately, since coming into the game with UK, he was averaging a filthy 31.6 ppg in South Carolina’s previous 3 SEC Conference games and is 5th in the nation and the SEC leader in scoring at 22 points per game.
As for the actual game, the 5’9 Downey was spectacular having one of the most inspiring individual performances of the season by carrying the obviously less talented Gamecocks on his back, converting multiple high degree of difficulty shots in traffic. Coach Cal tried putting virtually every backcourt player he had on the roster on Downey in an attempt to at least slow down USC sparkplug. John Wall, Eric Bledsoe, and Deandre Liggins all failed to prevent Downey from notching another 30 point outburst, his 4th in 6 conference games.
Kentucky’s dribble drive offense looked sluggish as their other freshman phenom, DeMarcus Cousins, was the only bright spot on offense by posting his 12th double-double of the season(27 pts, 12 rebs).
As the final horn sounded and the crowd stormed the court in the 68-62 upset win, Downey could be seen at center court pounding his chest yelling out, “I told you so!”
As a side note, today the SEC reportedly fined the University of South Carolina $25,000 because of a rule prohibiting fans from being on the court following a game. The SEC is the only conference to still enforce this rule.
Shouldn’t they get a pass for beating the #1 team in the country and the program notching their first victory over a #1 ranked team in their 102 year history? Maybe they could donate that money to Haiti?
Check out this U of SC student, who looks a little like MC Search of 3rd Bass fame, doing a hilarious outake on the upset win:
Allen Moll is an avid NBA and College Basketball fan who watches and studies games religiously and coaches youth basketball in his native Lehigh Valley region of Pennsylvania. Allen is a regular columnist for thehoopdoctors.com, Bleacherreport.com, UpperDeckblog.com, and his own site, Hoops Haven.
