4. Kentucky needs an SEC championship
As we have recently learned, a season is more than just the big games. Teams like Seton Hall can come up and ruin any momentum a team has. Wishing for no more upsets sounds like a good dream, but I’m going to take it another step in the right direction with wishing for an SEC championship.
This could either be a regular season or conference championship. Either way, they will beat enough quality teams to shoot up the rankings. If it’s a regular season title, that means that they probably only lost a small handful of games in the SEC, which would give them a great record. If it’s a tournament title, it would give them the last push in momentum to slide them above other teams.
These might seem farfetched with teams like Auburn and Tennessee standing in their way, but they always find a way to surprise people at the end. And at the end of the day, they haven’t played any conference games yet, so their SEC slate is perfectly clean.
Kentucky’s four combined games against Auburn and Tennessee are spread out evenly in the schedule, and they should have some easy wins before most of those games to get them on track to play. It’s hard to see any spot of the schedule where they will slump or spiral. They might lose to some worse teams along the way, but they should be in good shape to at least be a top 3 seed in the SEC tournament. And when we get to the tournament, anything can happen. Last season, Alabama helped clear the way for Kentucky by upsetting Auburn. If they can avoid the bigger teams early, you never know what to expect.