Koby Brea with seven threes as CATS Best #6 Gators
LEXINGTON – January 4, 2025 – Michael Willis
The Wildcats came away with a 106-100 victory today against the 6th ranked Florida Gators in their SEC opening game. It was the third win for the Mark Pope led Kentucky team over a top ten opponent this season. It was an exciting game that kept the Rupp Arena crowd on their feet for most of the game.
Kentucky played poorly on both end of the court to open the game, especially in rebounding. The Cats gained 0 defensive rebounds in the opening eight minutes of the game which led to a 7-point deficit. The outcome was beginning to look bleak for the Cats, but a 16-0 run gave Kentucky a 31-26 lead with 7:19 left in the first half. The Gators pulled even with the Cats with 2:22 left in the half, but the Cats ended the half on a 12-2 run to take a 52 to 42 lead into the locker room at halftime.
Florida opened the second half making their first 2 three-point attempts gutting the 10-point lead to only 4. The teams traded baskets for the majority of the second half with Kentucky maintaining a slight lead over Florida. A 10-0 run appeared as if the Cats may pull away from the Gators for good, however, due to some questionable calls the Gators stayed in the ball game. Clutch shots by Andrew Carr and Lamont Butler sealed the victory for the Wildcats late in the second half.
The Wildcats were down until 7:47 left in the first half, but after taking the lead, never allowed the Gators to lead the rest of the game. Koby Brea was the spark off the bench that most impacted the game and helped keep the lead when the game would get close. Brea led the Cats with 23 points making 7 of his 9 three-point attempts.
Kentucky had six players with 14 or more points including Lamont Butler with 19, Otega Oweh with 16, Amari Williams with 15, and 14 points for Jaxson Robinson and Andrew Carr.
The slow start for the Wildcats was from the poor rebounding that continued to plague the Cats the rest of the game. Kentucky ended the game with 8 less rebounds than Florida, but even worse, gave up 31 second chance points.
It is always great to win your opening SEC Conference game, but todays win also showed the BBN that the Cats will be able to compete against the best of the SEC. Kentucky will be on the road for the next two games. The Wildcats will face Georgia on Tuesday night at seven when they will look to add another victory to their SEC total.
