John Calipari liked how Kentucky responded to Team Africa's rally

John Calipari expected a sluggish outing from his team today. Not only were the Cats already guaranteed a spot in the gold medal game thanks to wins over Germany and Canada, they spent Friday hanging out at Drake’s house living out a teenager’s dream. So, when Team Africa — which has added three players since Tuesday night’s scrimmage vs. UK — came to play, Cal was not shocked.

“Told the staff today that I’ll be stunned if we have great energy and fight because of what we did yesterday. Anytime kids go swimming — they were in the pool for an hour and a half. So, I was like, sheesh. And then the game got rough and it got physical. That beats you down.”

When Africa cut Kentucky’s lead — which was 16 points at the start of the fourth quarter — to six with 5:20 remaining, Calipari was excited to see what his team would do. The Cats went on a 9-0 run, with big buckets from three freshmen (Justin Edwards, DJ Wagner, Reed Sheppard) and Antonio Reeves, the super-senior who leads the GLOBL Jam in scoring. Another freshman, Jordan Burks, had a dunk with 40 seconds left, Kentucky’s final points in the 104-92 victory.

“Here’s the thing that I love,” Calipari said. “We had to go rebound the ball to win and you know what? We end out outrebounding them and they were way bigger than us.

“The second thing was, I needed to see who could make shots in the moment. When the game is close, you’ve got to make a shot. Well, saw Antonio [Reeves]. You saw Tre [Mitchell]. You saw DJ [Wagner]. You saw Reed [Sheppard]. You saw Justin [Edwards]. Jordan [Burkes] went in because we were in foul trouble and he did his thing.”

Kudos to Team Africa, which looked like a totally different squad than the one that lost to Canada (25 points), Germany (9 points), and Kentucky earlier this week in a closed scrimmage. Part of that is due to the addition of Nelly Joseph, who played for Rick Pitino at Iona before transferring to New Mexico. He, Amr Zahran, and Jean Jacques Boissy all had 18 points for Team Africa, followed by Louisville big man Emmanuel Okorafor, who finished with 16 points and 5 rebounds. Even in the final seconds, Team Africa was battling, which John Calipari knows will help this team when the real season begins.

“I told them after, the game, literally, was just a game. We’re in the gold medal game, they’re in the bronze game. If they beat us by 100, we’re in the gold game, they’re in the bronze game. And they came out and played, that’s the best they shot, watching [their] games. And they fought and they wanted it. And I said, it’s because it’s you guys. They know who you are and they know what Kentucky is and that’s every time you play.”

Some might call it everybody’s Super Bowl.

“Wait until tomorrow night,” Calipari said of the gold medal game vs. either Canada or Germany. “It’s going to be crazy. And I don’t care if you’ve beat whoever you play tomorrow — it’s one of two teams. You beat them both. It won’t matter. It will be a war.”

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Kentucky’s Gold Medal game opponent decided tonight

Tomorrow, the Cats will face either Germany or Canada, teams they’ve beaten by 8 and 24 points respectively. Canada and Germany square off tonight at 8 p.m. ET for the chance to get a little revenge vs. Kentucky and the GLOBL Jam gold medal. Despite his team’s 3-0 mark in the event, Calipari knows both will present a challenge.

“Let me just say this: as we walked off the game against Germany and Canada, both teams were saying, ‘We want to see you again on Sunday.’ They both. One says, just one guy. No, no, it was both teams. And I’m saying well, maybe we’ll have some fun and hope we’re there.”

Kentucky vs. either Germany or Canada will air live on CBS Sports Network at 8 p.m. ET on Sunday night. Time for the Cats to get this gold.

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