Kentucky posted season-high in turnovers during loss to Vanderbilt: 'It's super disappointing.'

Kentucky came into Saturday’s game against Vanderbilt ranking among the nation’s 10 best teams in terms of not turning the ball over. Meanwhile, the Commodores entered as a Top 15 defensive group when it comes to forcing turnovers. Something was going to have to give.

Unfortunately for the Big Blue Nation, Kentucky did all the giving.

“Turnovers were a real problem for us tonight,” Head coach Mark Pope said postgame. “It’s really unfortunate. It’s been a place where we’ve excelled for most of the season. Credit to Vanderbilt. That’s what they do also, they’re good at turning teams over. They’re really good at exerting pressure and we didn’t manage the pressure well.”

The Wildcats, averaging just 10 miscues per outing this season, turned the ball over a season-high 17 times (to just 11 assists) in a 74-69 road loss to Vanderbilt. 10 of those came in an ugly opening half with three more happening in the final three minutes during a tight contest. Some were a result of the Commodores’ defensive pressure, but even more were simply the result of careless mistakes.

Lamont Butler (six turnovers), Brandon Garrison (four), and Otega Oweh (four) were the biggest offenders. Those numbers tied a season-high in turnovers for all three. Vanderbilt finished with 21 assists and just five turnovers. Kentucky is one of the nation’s worst teams at forcing turnovers.

“They did a good job getting us on our heels. It’s super disappointing,” Pope said. “This is a style of play that we love for teams to play. It’s a part of the game that — it’s like when we’re at our best offensively. And for a bunch of reasons that I know, and some reasons that I don’t, man, we were just heavy on our heels. And credit to Vanderbilt, of course. But it’s a really tough lesson for us, for our guys.”

Some turnovers are more acceptable than others. They can be easier to swallow when it happens in the midst of the offense and the rhythm is flowing. But turnovers are impossible to overlook when balls are being bounced off of their own legs, lazy passes are thrown beyond the perimeter, or slippery hands fail to hold tight. Vanderbilt scored 14 points off UK’s mistakes.

“We’re a low-turnover team but we had a lot of turnovers today,” Oweh said after the loss. “I feel like that was the main thing for everything. That’s the start of why everything went downhill. We just turned it over. If we take care of the ball more, we get more possessions and it’s a different story. We just got to take care of the ball.”

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