Calipari's update on Cason Wallace: "I have no idea"

Hidden beneath all of the excitement around Kentucky Basketball‘s impressive road win at Arkansas, there is still the concern about Cason Wallace‘s injury and how quickly he will return to the lineup. Wallace wasn’t ruled out of Saturday’s game until the team arrived in Fayetteville, so there is hope that he is close enough to be back in time for Friday’s quarterfinal game in the SEC Tournament.

Before Arkansas, Calipari even said he hoped Wallace would be available in time to play the Razorbacks. But after the game, Calipari didn’t seem as optimistic in his reply to a question about Wallace’s immediate return. When asked if Wallace will be ready for the SEC, Calipari said, “I have no idea. No idea.” 

Not one to divulge much about injuries, Calipari was exceptionally short in this new update regarding the team’s starting point guard. We don’t know any more than we did, but we do know Wallace needs to get back in a hurry because the postseason is here.

Calipari will speak Monday again on his call-in radio show, hopefully with a further update on Wallace’s status.

On playing without a point guard

Once the team arrived in Arkansas, John Calipari demanded to know Cason Wallace’s playing status for the game so he could put a plan together for Friday’s practice.

“They had to tell me whether they were playing or not before we practiced,” Calipari explained in his postgame comments. “Bang, okay. And then I went and we prepared a practice with who was there.

“Had Jacob bringing it up some, that was planned,” he continued. “You know he can handle it. So we’ll bring it up with somebody else. We put Jacob on Black because Black really hurt us last game. I’ve done that before. I haven’t done it this year, but I’ve done it before and I’ve done it with Jacob before. The other thing we did, we absolutely short-closed on everybody, knowing that they would make some shots and they did they made 31% They made seven threes. The way we played, you’re gonna give some of that up. But the way we played offensively, the way we moved the ball and the way we posted it, what we did, Oscar early in the game, was really good stuff.”

Calipari also said Adou Thiero played well. “Missed some shots but you know, he’s not perfect.”

Still, Kentucky needs Wallace for Friday’s game in Nashville.