Tag Archives: Kentucky Wildcats

The Brackets are Coming, The Brackets are Coming, Part I

Basketball, ,

I’ve double checked my algorithms, hacked into the ACC database, perused the conference standings, studied the league tourney bracket, invoked the spirit of Billy Packer, crunched the numbers, consulted Madame Ruth at 34th and Vine, and thus make this prognostication:

The University of Louisville Cardinals will be the #7 seed in next week’s Atlantic Coast Conference tournament. Which, if said prediction is correct, means the Cards will play at 7:00 PM next Wednesday at the Spectrum Center in Charlotte, and on your telly at Spectrum Channel 924.

They’ll play the victor of the 1st round matchup between the #10 and #15 seeds. Which could be any of the six bottom feeders of the league. When I tried to calculate which schools are more likely to settle into those spots, my computer said, “No Mas!”

 * * * * *

As long as we are looking and longing toward the horizon, let’s talk about Sunday a week, and the week that follows. Continue reading The Brackets are Coming, The Brackets are Coming, Part I →

Tuesday’s Hoop Dee Doo

Announcing, Basketball, ,

Late on weekday afternoons during hoops season on ESPNU, they show replays. Sometimes from games the night before, or from the previous weekend. Sometimes classics from the past.

On Monday, in advance of UVa’s bounceback W in Chapel Hill, the station showed a couple of Cavalier/ Tar Heels battles from yesteryear. Which I found both fascinating and telling, fostering memories.

The first was an ACC tourney semi from ’91.

Kentuckian Jeff Jones, then the youngest coach in the land, was leading the Wahoos. Rick Fox and King Rice were ballin’ for Dean Smith. The three point line was that short one they used in its early days.

They cut to the studio for an update from the SEC tourney. John Saunders sidekick was a fella named Rick Pitino with a full head of hair between coaching stops. They chatted briefly about whether Allen Houston, then playing for his dad at Tennessee, would leave early for the NBA.

The play by play and color guys were Mike Patrick and Dick Vitale.  Continue reading Tuesday’s Hoop Dee Doo →

Louisville CardFile: Kentucky

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Early Saturday evening, Doc and I were doing our usual post mortem autopsy. This time with a shroud of melancholy, because the victor was arch rival Kentucky.

I shared an analogy I was conjuring in order that this rehash might be elevated a bit literarily. Such as it can be.

Something like how when you’re making potage, you need more than a soup bone for maximum flavor. How you need vegetables, spices, robust meat or fish, all the necessary ingredients in a confluent meld, etc, etc, to create excellence, a taste above.

And how this gritty band of Cardinals, as game as they are proving to be, are but soup bone. There is only so much flavor to be extracted.

While the Wildcats do have that blend, along with any number of condimental players who can break out and cause observers to say, “Wow, savor that.”

Yesterday it was Tyler Herro, who tallied 24 on 10/13 marksmanship, 4/6 from long range, 5 rebounds and adhesive, clamp down defense. (Example: Ryan McMahon was only able to launch two attempts.)

So . . . sigh . . . yet again as it has come about for the last decade or so, I feel compelled to acknowledge that UK is taller, longer, quicker, faster, more assertive, and, yes, simply better. Continue reading Louisville CardFile: Kentucky →

Venting on the NET and that Rick Pitino Guy

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Few are the hoopaholics who were sad to see the demise of the NCAA tournament selection benchmark known as the RPI.

It was flawed. To say the least.

It has been replaced by a super secret formula — locked in the same safe with Colonel Sanders’ fried chicken recipe I am told — known as the NET.

I’d explain it, if I could. But, I dunno. So I shan’t.

What’s observable is the high regard the algorithm holds for such outliers as #7 Houston or #8 North Carolina State. As well as the disregard for such “better” teams like #24 Auburn.

Or, #28 Kentucky.

Among the surprisingly regarded are the University of Louisville Cardinals, sitting at #17, eleven spots ahead of arch rival. That is also a loftier ranking than #19 Marquette or #20 Indiana, both of whom defeated the Cards, and a lower spot than #10 Michigan State, which fell to the Cardinals.

Mine’s not to reason why, etc, etc. It’s a good thing for Louisville and its legion of fans, many of whom are scurrying to jump back on board.

It probably has to do with strength of schedule, I suppose, that W over Sparty and close encounters with other Top 20 squads.

Whatever. Continue reading Venting on the NET and that Rick Pitino Guy →

Seedy K’s Peerless Pigskin Prognostications: Week XI

Football, Gaming, , ,

There are at least a couple of regular readers for whom it would appear they seem to derive their whole sense of well being from my weekly follies here at Prediction Central. They are ever quick to point out my miscues, and draw great delight from same.

When I suffered four losing weekends in a row — Weeks III-VI — they were full with a deluded sense that all was right in the world. When I picked a bunch of locks to go 5-0 in Week  VII, they scoffed.

After the following consecutive 3-2 weeks, they smirked warily.

And, after last weekend, another perfecto for yours truly, they . . . well . . . they . . . let’s just say, to coin a cliché,  the silence is deafening.

For the stat geeks amongst ya, I’m 16-4 over the last four weeks, now 30-20 on the campaign.

Yo, dudes, ye who would be quick to naysay, uh, where are you? How about some well deserved propers? Some R E S P E C T.

Not that I mean to trumpet my own triumphs or anything like that.

Anyhow, the season is entering the home stretch. Those last two spots in the CFP remain somewhat up for grabs. Bowl eligibility is the target for many. And U of L Cardinal fans are checking fifteen times a day for that Tyra Tweet, advising a change is gonna come.

Confidence restored, my prognosticatorial legerdemain patently evident once again, I provide this week’s winners: Continue reading Seedy K’s Peerless Pigskin Prognostications: Week XI →

Seedy K’s Peerless Pigskin Prognostications: Week V

Football, Gaming, ,

The University of Louisville Football Cardinals, who were whomped up both sides of their heads in Ole Virginny at the door step of Monticello,  are not the only folks who would like to forget last weekend.

There are the promoters of the music festival on River Road as well as old Zeppelin heads who were planning to catch Robert Plant one more once on Sunday, which day of tuneage was cancelled because of forty days and nights worth of rain that fell while David Byrne was dancing and singing in a gray suit instead of Patagonia. Psycho Killer indeed.

Then there’s yours truly’s inner seer who was headed for a truly ignominious set of predictions. Until saved somewhat by a late comeback from the Stanford Cardinal in Eugene. Thanks to that W, and the continued ascendency of the Kentucky Wildcats as projected here, the weekend was merely awful, falling just short of a call to the Haz Mat Squad and a trip to the ER.

Of course, I picked my U of L Cards to prevail. They did not. For some reason which makes not a whit of sense in retrospect, I picked Rock Chalk Jayhawk to prevail at Baylor. They did not. Then there’s U of L’s rumored/ hoped for next coach now at Purdue, Jeff Brohm, proving for the first time this campaign he might be up to coaching at Power 5 level. I picked visiting BC, which couldn’t get away from the Wabash and back to Beantown soon enough.

Thus, 2-3 for the weekend evens me at 10 up, 10 down for the campaign.

Before you start to impugn this weekly crystal ball exercise, know that I actually ran into a regular reader yesterday at lunch, who wanted to know this week’s picks in advance, promising not to reveal them until publication.

It’s nice to know at least one reader cares.

Battered, severely enough to go on the IR list, but forging ahead in the name of truth, justice, the American Way and contractual obligations, here are this week’s winners: Continue reading Seedy K’s Peerless Pigskin Prognostications: Week V →

Seedy K’s Peerless Pigskin Prognostications: Week IV

Football, ,

For those nagging nabobs of negativitude who have been inspecting the results of my predictions and have been kind enough to inquire, the answer is “No, I’m not inclined to change the title of this weekly endeavor.”

Sweet of you to ask.

Yet, I must admit, last weekend, I suffered my second under .500 slate of the season.

Auburn couldn’t hold on at home against emerging LSU. TCU learned that Ohio State is pretty good on the gridiron, even if the Buckeye head man, now off suspension, is less than sympathetic when it comes to spouse abuse if it might impact his team’s fortunes.

And Oklahoma State, victor over Boise State, now that it no longer pays for the services of a defensive strategist with the initials BVG, actually shows some mettle stopping it’s foes when they have the ball, making the Cowboys both an outlier and title contender in the Big 12.

Kentucky and Louisville both won payday games, the latter barely.

2-3 for the weekend makes it 8-7 for the season.

I forge ahead. This week’s winners: Continue reading Seedy K’s Peerless Pigskin Prognostications: Week IV →

Louisville CardFile: Kentucky

Basketball, ,

Well . . . uh . . . um . . . ah . . . yeah . . . well . . . okay . . . there’s this.

Not only was this not the worst loss in U of L hoops history, at least from an actual point differential if not psychological decimation — Centre 61, Louisville 7 on 02/18/20 holds that record — it wasn’t the worst loss to the Wildcats in the series.

UK 76, U of L 46 on 12/18/99.

So Friday’s 29 point evisceration could have been, and has been, worse.

So the Cards got that goin’ for them. Which is, uh, not really so nice. But some benediction from the Lama, any kind, soothing words would be welcome.

Ya know, kids, there’s simply not much to say. The Cards were wopped up the side of their heads by arch rival Kentucky.  Continue reading Louisville CardFile: Kentucky →

Louisville CardFile: Kentucky

Football, , ,

In retrospect, there was a single play that indicated how inevitable U of L’s payback victory over its hated arch rival really was.

The outcome of the smackdown was already a given when the Cardinals, up 37-10,  started a drive at their own one yard line with 12:58 to play.

Lamar Jackson, who has blamed himself for last season’s loss because of his game-denying giveaway late in that battle, fumbled on first down. In the end zone. But, as cool as he was all day — and make no mistake, LJ has never been as collected and in charge as he was Saturday in Commonwealth Stadium — Jackson picked up the ball, intuited where there might be a crack through which to escape, found it, foraged for yardage and Heismaned his way for a 15 yard pickup.

This one was never in doubt. That play was typical of how U of L rose to the occasion every moment.

Two and half minutes later, U of L finished the 99 yard journey when Jackson lofted a TD pass to Jaylen Smith.

For all the incredible feats of legerdemain that Jackson has performed while at the helm of the Cards, his demeanor and flawless performance against the Wildcats Saturday stands at the top of the list for me. Continue reading Louisville CardFile: Kentucky →

Seedy K’s Peerless Pigskin Prognostications: Week VI

Football, Gaming, ,

I needn’t explain why now more than ever, we must cherish the importance of the diversion we know as college pigskin.

As the calendar flips to October, when games mean more as league races ratchet up, it’s important that squads hit mid-season form.

So too prognosticatory savants. Thus, it is with a great deal of pleasure that the Kid provides these stats from last weekend: 41-21, 31-21, 34-23, 24-20 and 55-10. These are the final scores of wins by Fresno State, Navy, Akron, Kentucky and the University of Louisville Cardinals.

Need I mention who correctly picked the outcome of All Those Games?

That’s right, class, it isn’t necessary.

The second perfect weekend of the campaign has my season success soaring to 19-11.

So, with wind in my sails, and a firm hand on the rudder, I sail off into . . . sail off into . . . uh, oh well, I’ve lost my metaphor . . . but here are this coming weekend’s winners: Continue reading Seedy K’s Peerless Pigskin Prognostications: Week VI →