John Calipari criticizes officiating when asked about offensive rebounding problems vs. Kansas

John Calipari was not happy with the referees after Kentucky‘s loss to Kansas.

The Wildcats are one of the top offensive rebounding teams in the country, averaging 13.5 o-boards per game.

But Kentucky had only four offensive rebounds Saturday — including zero in the first half — and Calipari thought the Jayhawks got away with fouls that weren’t being called.

“We’re one of the top offensive rebounding teams in the country,” Calipari said. “But you got to go and when it gets physical you go. You do know that if the shot goes up, and they block out facing the man, you cannot do that. I don’t believe you can. You got to turn and block them out. You can’t do that. So we’ll all watch the tape and see. I don’t blame them for doing it if it’s not going to be called. I do it, too.”

John Calipari emphasizes rebounding wasn’t what lost Kentucky the game

Despite his annoyance at the lack of foul calls while rebounding, John Calipari wanted to make sure everyone knew that he’s not blaming the loss on that.

He said his team lost the game, not the refs.

“That’s not why we lost the game,” Calipari said. “They made three threes at the end and we missed a bunch of threes that we had a chance to close the gap or go up and do it and we missed them. It happens but you miss him and then go offensive rebound. I think we did on one. Then we kicked it out and we got another one, he missed that one too. But that’s part of the game.”

One thing he wants to figure out for the team’s next game is continuing to get the ball to Oscar Tshiebwe.

“I thought we were in pretty good sync for a while, but you still want to run and get the ball moving because it’s hard to trap him and crowd him if we’re flying up the court and throwing it to him,” Calipari said.