[Cactus Jack]

Revisiting The Above Conversation:

Kentucky now stands 10-1 with wins against Duke, Gonzaga, and Louisville and a loss against Clemson. We have two non-conference games remaining: this Saturday against Ohio State then Brown on New Year's Eve. Barring a huge upset, the worst that happens is 11-2 with an additional neutral site loss to Ohio State.

Some of the above responses to what we'd consider a successful season were: "10 wins, 15 wins, putting a system in place, going to the NCAA Tournament, winning a game in the NCAA Tournament".

We've exceed the 10 wins, and it looks like 15 or more wins is a formality. We're #4 in the country and on pace to make the NCAA Tournament with the type of seed that would at least lead you to believe that we'd be favored (or at worst a slight underdog) in the first round. Suffice to say that we're on pace to meet or surpass everyone's expectations.



The SEC Schedule:

The SEC slate will be rough and I honestly think we have at least a handful of losses in store. The 18-games we know of are listed below, and we'll have at least one game in the SEC Tournament.

There's a Home and Home with:
Alabama, Tennessee, and Vanderbilt

Away games at:
Georgia, Mississippi State, Ole Miss, Texas, Oklahoma, and Missouri

Home games against:
Florida, Texas A&M, Arkansas, South Carolina, Auburn, and LSU



Moving Forward:

Short of us taking some huge losses during SEC play and the wheels falling off for everyone who'll matter in our metrics (i.e., we know Duke, Gonzaga, and Clemson), I don't know how you keep this team out of the tournament.

Realistically, we could go .500 in the SEC and I don't see any way that we aren't at least a 10-seed, even if you assume that we only beat teams who are currently unranked.

.500 with no more wins over ranked teams means nine losses to: #6 Alabama x2, #1 Tennessee x2, #7 Florida, #17 Ole Miss, #2 Auburn, #12 Texas A&M, and #14 Oklahoma.

Currently, the lowest ranked SEC team in KenPom's (KP) rankings is South Carolina at #68. For more perspective, Arkansas is ranked 12th of 16 SEC teams at #40, meaning that 30% of KenPom's top 40 is from the SEC. I'll run through the teams below and their current KenPom rank is noted in parenthesis.

Assuming Kentucky goes .500, the team finishes the regular season 20-11 with neutral site wins against Duke & Gonzaga, no bad losses, a road win against Texas (KP #38), Miss. St (KP #30), Georgia (KP #39), & Missouri (KP #49) and home wins against LSU (KP #59), South Carolina (KP #68), and Arkansas (KP #40). With that resume and the Kentucky brand, an eight seed is around what I'd expect.


Suffice to say, it looks like we're going to meet or at least exceed the majority of expectations from a few months ago. With that said, now that we've been spoiled, what do you consider a successful season from this point forward? What is acceptable and what is unacceptable? Short of losing out and missing the tournament while getting embroiled in a scandal, I think it's fair to say that Pope has at least met a good portion of the fan base's Year 1 expectations.