Kentucky players preparing for outside shooting, 'hard to guard' offense from Lipscomb

After taking a week off following Tuesday’s high-profile win over Duke, how will the Kentucky Wildcats respond against a lesser opponent? The anticipation for tomorrow night’s game against Lipscomb won’t come with the same amount of energy that it did for the Blue Devils. Not from a fan base perspective, at least. But Kentucky has to prepare for the next team with the same amount of concentration and precision it did last week — no matter who is on the other side of the floor.

We’ll see a few of these games in the following weeks. After Lipscomb on Tuesday night, the Wildcats will host Jackson State, Western Kentucky, and Georgia State — all ranked outside of KenPom’s Top 100 — before traveling to face a good Clemson squad on Dec. 3. But looking ahead always does more bad than it does good.

Kentucky needs to treat Lipscomb the exact same way they did with Duke.

“Lipscomb is a very tough team. They played Arkansas very tough at their place,” Kentucky fifth-year point guard Lamont Butler said during a Monday morning press conference. “They had a tough one with Western Kentucky yesterday. They got some really talented players. The offense that they run is pretty hard to guard. We’re just gonna try to do our thing and be able to try to disrupt their offense and be able to make plays on our offense, especially in transition.”

Lipscomb, led by head coach Lennie Acuff, who is now in his sixth season in charge, will bring a 2-3 record into Rupp Arena. The Bisons have secured wins over Duquesne and Wofford, but they lost by 16 to John Calipari‘s Arkansas squad before falling to Belmont and Western Kentucky by a combined six points in their previous two outings.

The matchup with Arkansas is the most interesting. Lipscomb actually led 17-16 over halfway through the first half before the Razorbacks took an 11-point lead into the break. The Bisons even got within four points down the stretch of the second half before Arkansas put the foot on the gas. They’re a resilient group that won’t give up easily. Four guys played over 32 minutes in that loss, so expect a similarly tight rotation against Kentucky

“Whole bunch of three-point shooters. Physical team,” Kentucky sophomore center Brandon Garrison said of Lipscomb on Monday. “Can’t just go in there and think we’re gonna walk over them because they’re gonna put up a fight.”

It’s only been five games for Lipscomb, but the stats don’t indicate many overwhelming strengths. As Garrison mentioned, the Bisons do have a bulk of outside weapons. Their top four rotation pieces all average 3.8 or more three-point attempts per outing. That being said, Lipscomb as a team shoots just 31.8 percent from deep, but they’ve made nine or more three-pointers in three of their five contests so far. Expect them to jack up plenty on Tuesday. The Bisons don’t allow many free throws either, but Kentucky isn’t a team that lives at the line anyway.

Some of Lipscomb’s disappointing numbers are somewhat by design though. The schedule is front-heavy. Lipscomb is a team projected in the preseason to win the Atlantic Sun Conference with a pair of All-ASUN players in Jacob Ognacevic and Will Pruitt — currently the team’s two leading scorers. All three losses so far have come against teams either right at or outside of the KenPom Top 150. Kentucky is the last team within the Top 150 (ranked No. 22) the Bisons will play all season long.

So while the numbers don’t paint Lipscomb to be a good team right now, that won’t be the case by the end of the season. The Bisons will be hoping to crack the NCAA Tournament come March. This will be a tougher challenge for Kentucky than Wright State and Bucknell were. The Wildcats will still be the overwhelming favorite and for good reason, but this should be a good post-Duke test.

Tipoff on Tuesday night is set for 7:00 p.m. EST on the SEC Network+.