The Athletic has live coverage of the men’s NCAA Tournament Selection Show and bracket reveal.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Death and taxes may be life’s two guarantees, but these are the SEC tournament’s two annual certainties: Kentucky fans taking over the venue in question and John Calipari making sure everyone knows how much he hates the SEC tournament.
He did it again this weekend, unprompted, after the win over Ole Miss that got him to Sunday’s title game against Vanderbilt at Bridgestone Arena. Calipari groused about having to watch film instead of taking a nap he needed because of the sleep deprivation created by ridiculous start times in this event.
“Not a big (conference) tournament guy,” he said. “Never have been.”
That doesn’t mean he doesn’t win them. Nor that he doesn’t want to win them. Nor that he doesn’t enjoy winning them. This one, especially, had to be sweet — his seventh overall, the first six of those at Kentucky, which emphasizes the strong work he has done since leaving for Arkansas.
His team’s 86-75 win over Vanderbilt, in what for 38 minutes was an absolute banger of a game, makes him the only coach to win this tournament with two different programs. It also gives him half of Arkansas’ all-time SEC tourney titles — the program’s only other one came in 2000.
And there wasn’t a Kentucky fan in sight as Calipari earned a net cutting and served notice: His Razorbacks (26-8), led by one of the best players in the sport in freshman point guard Darius Acuff Jr., are dangerous. This team is perhaps as capable as any lower than the top two seed lines of making a run to the Final Four in Indianapolis.
“Make sure we stay together, make sure we stay a brotherhood, we’ll be fine,” said Acuff, an NBA-ready maestro from Detroit who had an absurd 91 points and 23 assists in three games over the weekend, following up SEC Player of the Year honors with tournament MVP honors.
“I’ll tell all the boys who are listening: You pass on this one, you’ll regret it,” Calipari, referencing NBA general managers in the upcoming draft. “All of them.”
No surprise, Calipari talked about everything but winning the conference tournament championship after winning a conference tournament championship. This was true before the game as well. Assistant coach Chin Coleman, a freshly snipped piece of nylon net in his right hand during the celebration on the court, said Calipari downplayed what Sunday’s game meant before the team hit the floor.
“I think sometimes he’s trying to ease the tension by saying things like that,” Coleman said. “But these guys were like, ‘No, no, no, coach. It’s a championship, we want to win it and we’re gonna win it.’”
“Hell no,” is how Arkansas senior forward Trevon Brazile described the general reaction to Calipari’s “No biggie” approach. Apparently, senior big man Nick Pringle used a stronger word than that in the locker room. Fine then, Calipari responded in what sounds like a classic case of reverse psychology: “Give me a championship effort.”
He got it. As Calipari says often, and correctly, these conference tournaments should be seen as opportunities to improve performance and seeding for the NCAA Tournament. Arkansas may not have done much with the latter — beating upstart Ole Miss does nothing for a resume — but the play of Acuff’s talented, young supporting cast is exactly what Calipari was hoping to see.
Another freshman guard, Meleek Thomas, was as much a key as Acuff in overcoming the Rebels in overtime in Saturday’s semifinal. He scored 29 in that game and ended up with 44 in three wins over the weekend — providing a shot-making complement to Acuff.
Sophomore wing Billy Richmond III came up big Sunday with 18 points, and the Razorbacks got a strong tournament from their 4-5 combination of Brazile (44 points and 29 rebounds in three games) and Malique Ewin (25 and 20). Brazile hit the two late triples Sunday that did in Vanderbilt, and if he’s going to hit that shot, a top-six offense nationally gets even scarier.
A defense that ranks outside the top 50 nationally remains a concern, and Vanderbilt (26-8) and its dynamic backcourt of Tyler Tanner and Duke Miles got better looks than even its 75 points and 10 3-pointers would suggest.
But the old saying about guard play in March, like the one about death and taxes, is as true as it is cliche. And for all of Calipari’s freshman point guard greats over the years, Acuff may be better than all of them.
“His shiftiness and the speed’s elite,” Byington said of Acuff. “His speed and the way he moves is going to be good for the NBA too. It’s not just college. With him needing more than one guy that can guard him, team defense, we were compromised today because we wanted multiple bodies at him to try to help out. He’s a willing passer. He can make the right play. We try to make other guys make plays, and they did. So it was just one of those things where he’s so talented, (but) he didn’t fight the game.”
For both of these teams, backcourt play is going to lead the way if they’re going to advance in the NCAA Tournament. Tanner (54 points, 13 assists and five steals in three games) and Miles (64 points, 21 assists and 10 steals) were effective all weekend. And while Florida is the clear top Final Four hopeful from the SEC, that’s the weaker part of the Gators’ arsenal — as Vanderbilt exposed in Saturday’s 91-74 semifinal rout of Todd Golden’s team.
Calipari may hate these things, but that’s 16 conference tournament titles in his career. For whatever that’s worth.
“Let’s see where we’re seeded. Then I’ll tell you if this … does this matter? I don’t know,” Calipari said. “We’re gonna find out if it matters.”
What matters to a lot of fans, in particular Arkansas and Kentucky fans, is that Calipari has a better team with a better chance of advancing in the NCAA Tournament than Mark Pope does at Kentucky. That might be worth sacrificing a nap or two.
“I don’t know what they say,” Coleman, who was with Calipari at Kentucky, said of the fans. “Coach Cal is the ‘GOAT.’ That’s all I’m gonna say.”