Kentucky Wildcats: 3 Thoughts On 71-52 Victory Over Buffalo

It can be difficult to learn much from early season mismatches, but Sunday’s game between the Kentucky Wildcats and Buffalo Bulls definitely provided us a few interesting storylines to watch as the season progresses. The Bulls gave the Wildcats fits during the first half, building a five point lead at the break. In the end, Kentucky’s size overwhelmed Buffalo and the Wildcats ran away with the win.

Kentucky’s “Platoon System” won’t work as advertised.

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Two games into the season, and one of the offseason’s most talked about in-game strategies already looks like it’s in trouble. The way that Kentucky’s platoon system was described, a “Blue Platoon” player like Willie Cauley-Stein never would’ve seen the court at the same time as a “White Platoon” player like Marcus Lee.

In practice, fouls make this nearly impossible. Freshman Karl-Anthony Towns committed three fouls in the first half and Lee was subbed into the Blue lineup. Towns would foul out with five minutes to go in the game.

If the platoon system were anything more than a fancy way of saying “we have a really deep bench,” John Calipari would’ve subbed one of the guys from outside the rotation to fill in for Towns. In reality, he simply pulled a player from the White platoon.

The fact that a MAC team replacing its best player from a 19-10 season was able to draw enough fouls to throw off the Platoon System shows that it’ll be tough to maintain when the competition level increases later in the season and during the tournament.

Kentucky’s length and depth will give teams fits

That’s not to say that Kentucky isn’t poised for an amazing season. Foul trouble for a player like Towns would be a major problem for most teams, but he was subbed in with four fouls with a good portion of the game left to be played. Towns committed his fifth foul within minutes, but the Wildcats continued on as if nothing had changed.

While Kentucky’s length is no secret after everyone but Julius Randle returned from last year’s front court, Sunday was a perfect example of its effects. Buffalo shot 43% from the field in the first half and built up a five point lead, but Kentucky was stifling down the stretch, holding the Bulls to 4-for-19 shooting in the second half to flip the upset bid on its head.

Buffalo will bounce back well after losing MAC Player of the Year Javon McCrea

Until the game neared the half and Buffalo had the lead, there wasn’t much anticipation for this match-up. MAC pollsters picked Buffalo to finish lower in the MAC East than AP pollsters picked Kentucky to finish nationally. Still, the Bulls had most of Big Blue Nation sitting on its hands and waiting for the Wildcats to stretch out the lead well into the second half.

Even without McRea, Buffalo seems to be in for a nice season. When the Bulls had the lead, it wasn’t because of an outlandish shooting percentage, the team was simply executing well and taking advantage of Kentucky’s mistakes. If the team can get consistent efforts that even approach what it produced today, the Bulls should finish in the hunt for the decidedly weaker division of the MAC. Will Regan, the team’s returning scoring leader from last year, has yet to make a basket this season. Once he gets going offensively, it’s easy to see Buffalo making a strong push in the MAC East.