One final question for Kentucky basketball in a season of what-ifs

It’s easy to focus on the big picture here: Kentucky basketball‘s run of postseason woes, the lack of Final Fours and heartbreaking losses. The NCAA Tournament is a single-elimination monster that gives and takes, and unfortunately, it’s taken a hell of a lot from the Wildcats in recent years. This one? Phew. A doozy.

But those conversations can and will be had later. Reactionary takes aren’t productive in the grand scheme of things, especially given the ups and downs of this season and how things closed out. The expectations going into the season as a top-five team with title dreams, hitting rock bottom and clawing back, only to have inconsistent play keep the plane from taking off the runway and soaring to the final destination as planned?

You get the first-round monkey off your back with a win vs. Providence, only to follow it up with a Round of 32 loss to No. 3 seed Kansas State, 75-69 final. Kentucky would shoot just 41.3% from the field and 20% from three while turning the ball over 16 times, 11 in the first half. Antonio Reeves, averaging 22 points per contest over his last six games, finished with five points on 1-15 shooting and 1-10 from three. Jacob Toppin, one of the team’s most consistent threats in the back half of the season, had two points on 1-7 shooting and 0-2 from deep. A combined 2-22 from two of your most valuable pieces, 1-12 from beyond the arc. Open looks, none falling. Brutal, especially for two dudes coming off star performances against the Friars, combining for 40 points.

And then on the other end, you have a trio of clutch 3-pointers to turn a four-point lead for Kentucky into a five-point lead for Kansas State. Tough shot after tough shot, responding to very real adversity thrown their way. 5-foot-8 point guard Markquis Nowell launched dagger after dagger, walking the walk after talking the talk — hell, he was firing fake bows and arrows toward the UK bench on just about every made shot. It was like reliving Kemba freaking Walker all over again. 16 points in the final 7:44, 23 in the second half alone and 27 total in 40 minutes. Killer.

Keyontae Johnson and Ismael Massoud deserve their credit, too. Tough, tough threes to pull ahead and seal it.

At the end of the day, Kansas State made the shots Kentucky missed. The opportunities were there for both teams, but only one was able to take advantage. A different bounce here or there could have changed the entire trajectory of the game, extended the season. That’s March.

And this is the reality, a harsh and bitter one. Sobering, really.

Media members streamed into the locker room after the loss, beelining for Kentucky star Oscar Tshiebwe, the man who has never failed to have the answers during his two-year career in Lexington. This time? Back turned to the room, facing his locker, he sat slumped over in deafening silence. Minutes passed before freshman teammate Ugonna Onyenso stood up and leaned on his mentor and role model’s shoulder.

“You’ve got people waiting behind you. Just turn around and answer questions. This is not fun — it’s tough for (everyone).”

The man so quick to hold court and comfort with his words was speechless.

“In my mind, I don’t even know what to talk about,” Tshiebwe said. He stuck to his script of fighting and trusting God and knowing everything happens for a reason, but the reigning national player of the year who poured everything he had into this game — 25 points and 18 rebounds — and yet another NCAA Tournament — 21.0 points and 19.7 rebounds in three total March Madness outings — had nothing to show for it. He returned for a part two of his story in Lexington, an opportunity to turn individual accolades in year one into team rewards in year two.

The result? One SEC Tournament win and one NCAA Tournament win across two seasons for arguably the most physically dominant player in Kentucky basketball history.

“I’m probably going to say sorry to Big Blue Nation because when I came here, my dream was to do something great,” he said. “But two years in a row, it did not happen.”

An apology from the last person in the room who owed one — a completely unnecessary gesture for him or anyone, frankly. But that’s what happens when you attempt to describe the indescribable, especially as the team’s star and face of the program. Yet there he sat, 25 long and excruciating minutes, doing his best to break it all down while choked up and teary-eyed.

They all gave it their best shot, trying to work through the idea that their season was over before any tangible reward ever came. Emotions ranging from disbelief to regret to anger to pure sadness, all of the above in most cases.

“They hit big shots down the stretch and we couldn’t,” senior forward Jacob Toppin said. “That’s why they won the game.”

“It was just one of those things where — it wasn’t my night,” senior guard Antonio Reeves added. “I had great looks and I kept shooting the ball. In those situations, I thought I was going to hit. But I couldn’t hit.”

“I want to play next week and compete for championships. This sucks right now,” said senior guard CJ Fredrick. “… Every time we hit rock bottom, we always responded. It was the guys in the locker room, we leaned on each other. I don’t think I’ve ever been on a team that’s been through what we went through this season.”

Emptiness, a reality no one wanted to face. A season of what-ifs ending in Greensboro ending in, yep, you guessed it, more what-ifs. What if Reeves hit one of his first few 3-pointers, all rattling out, off by an inch or two? Does he get rolling and flip the script? Or Toppin, who had been downright terrific in recent weeks? What if he gets a pull-up jumper or two to fall? One more made three from Fredrick or Cason Wallace or Chris Livingston? Shoot, even a stop after a made basket to capture some momentum — what was with all of the easy runout scores?

Maybe Gerry Pollard is focused less on getting into a pissing contest with John Calipari and more on officiating the damn game — eh, that’s asking for a miracle. Between the blown goaltending charge on Daimion Collins, phantom 3-point foul call on Toppin, head-butt to Reeves and foul on the pass/shot on Wallace (among others), there’s not much hope there. Just a terrible night from the stripes all around.

Nevertheless, with so much hinging on this postseason run, it’s tough to lose like this. It’s tough to see the pain in the eyes of a group that truly believed redemption was on the horizon, a run to make up for the endless speed bumps they faced throughout the season, especially those returning after the end-of-year disaster last March. So many ups and downs, both publicly and behind closed doors, some rather serious. And for what? The opportunity to look ahead to next season, turning our attention to the next crop of blue-chip recruits? Dangling the ‘wait till next year’ piece of meat in front of our faces again? Nah. It’s just not enough, not for what this group went through. They deserved more, something many will never get at this level again.

The offseason begins now, one that will again feature stay-or-go draft decisions, players entering the portal and coming from it. Another roster rebuild, potentially another staff rebuild. Significant turnover across the board is inevitable, as is the excitement that follows. The shiny-new-object mindset never fails.

And while the look-ahead begins, I can’t help but hang onto this group a little while longer. At the end of the day, the visible pain in that locker room is going to linger, and that shouldn’t be overlooked. When your superstar center who broke nearly every individual record college basketball has to offer can’t properly define what his legacy is in Lexington or how he hopes to be remembered?

Yeah, that’s a tough pill to swallow.

“Right now, I don’t know,” Tshiebwe said. “I really don’t know how to explain that. I just — maybe another time, I don’t know.”

The question is, how do you define this team’s legacy? How do you judge a team of standout individual talent — five players with 20-point performances overall — that simply couldn’t consistently come together as a cohesive unit by year’s end? One that couldn’t string together more than a four-game winning streak in a 31-game regular season with just three postseason games in total, one win?

As individual pieces, it’s hard to imagine they won’t be remembered fondly with plenty of emotional and physical growth to go around. As a team, though, the Wildcats fell short of expectations from start to finish, this one being the biggest letdown. And like all Kentucky teams, it’s the last time we’ll see that group back together on the floor, again missing the ultimate goal the players felt was attainable.

More what-ifs.