WATCH: Mark Pope, Kentucky players recap win over Texas A&M

Kentucky’s 81-69 win over No. 11 Texas A&M wasn’t pretty at times, but you never complain about a win, especially one over a top-15 team and in this year’s SEC. Mark Pope said as much in his postgame press conference.

“I love winning a game where we never felt great,” Pope said. “There was no three-minute run where we felt great, where we felt like we really got into a flow. For our guys to win that game is really important.”

Pope was especially pleased with his team’s rebounding. Kentucky outrebounded Texas A&M 40-30 and limited the Aggies, the nation’s top offensive rebounding team, to just 11 offensive boards. Pope called it an “epic effort.” Amari Williams played a big role in that, pulling down a game-high 12 rebounds in just 23 minutes. Jaxson Robinson was second on the team in rebounding with eight boards, just one part of an impressive performance vs. his former school. After scoring 27 points at Mississippi State, Robinson had 22 points vs. Texas A&M, including five threes.

“One offensive [rebound] and 7 defensive is massive,” Pope said of Robinson’s rebounding. “One of the things we’ve been talking about is our guards making a bigger impact. Otega had 8 last game. Jax had seven this game. That is a massive difference maker for us on the glass.”

Hear more from Pope below.

Jaxson Robinson, Amari Williams, and Travis Perry also spoke with the media following the win, Kentucky’s fifth over a ranked team this season. Robinson and Williams touched on rebounding, while Perry talked about how he’s settling into his role of backup point guard. Perry had two huge threes tonight, the fifth game in a row he’s scored.

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Mark Pope Transcript

MARK POPE: Man, what a great job.  Buzz is just one of one.  He is a culture guy and gets his guys to play hard and grind it out and they are down a really important piece.  They are still playing just tough and hard-nosed and an elite level basketball.  That’s a real credit to him and those guys, they are playing really hard.  They are a really really good team.  I think top 10, top 11 team in the country.  They fought tonight. I couldn’t be more proud of our guys. I love winning a game where we never felt great, we didn’t feel great.  There was no 60 second, well, maybe there was a 60 second.  There was no three-minute run where we felt great where we felt like we really got into a flow.  For our guys to win that game is really important.  I like the way we can win different ways.  I’m proud of our effort on the glass and on the defensive end.  And we still can get so much better.  I will take any questions.  

Q Mark, Jaxson another good offensive performance tonight. But also, the 8 rebounds. I know that’s been an important part of his game.  Just what do you keep seeing from him there?  

MARK POPE: Well, the best thing for Jaxson is he missed his first three or four maybe, give or take?  And it is just fun to see growth, right?  You know, you miss your first three or four shots and you can start evaluating if you are having a night or not and he didn’t.  He terms that slow start into a night where he was pretty productive.  He has been consistently great on the defensive end and he has been consistently trying to grow his game on the toughness end.  For him to be in this game, like this particular game, the way this thing rolls and do what he did on the glass.  1 offensive and 7 defensive is massive.  One of the things we’ve been talking about is our guards making a bigger impact.  Otega had 8 last game.  Jax had seven this game.  That is a massive difference maker for us on the glass.  It’s pretty great.  

Q Coach, you talked about how you wasn’t as worried about assists but you were more worried about leading to open shots is what you said in the post-game the other day.  Tonight it felt like in the first half that there was open shots but they were not falling.  But then it didn’t seem like the default was to go one on one and they stayed in the offense and the shots started falling.  Is that true and if so, how did you feel about that?  

MARK POPE: A couple of things.  We started out 1 for 11, is that true?  From three?  And so, that’s not very fun.  We practice this every day.  We talked about this box drill, this shooting drill we do every day where we have to get to 140.  And a lot of days, it’s a two minute drill.  A lot of days it’s continuous and a lot of days you are looking up at the shot clock or the scoreboard and it is one minute 55.  The guys just keep going and they know they are going to keep making shots.  To start 1 for 11, who is my math majors?  8%, 7%, and finish up solid 33% is pretty great.  Especially against a unbelievable defensive team like this.  You know, I am proud and I love the fact we got close to 30.  I wish we would have got to 30.  I did feel like the guys, you know we never were flowing great offensively, but we just kept fighting and fighting and fighting until we finally found some cracks.  But I thought they were terrific defensively tonight and I thought they really caused some issues.  You know, I mean, it gives you a sense of how potent we are offensively, you feel like it’s a night where you just can’t get a bucket and you put up 81, that’s pretty great.  It’s fun to have that team.  

Q Mark, just two games ago I know you guys were searching answers on the glass. To outrebounded A&M, one of the best rebounding teams in the country and the best offensive rebounding team in the country by 10 and kind of dominate them physically at times. Just how impressive is that?  

MARK POPE: It’s awesome, isn’t it?  I was saying in one of the pregame things, I can’t remember.  You know you are really blessed as a coach when you have great students.  What I mean by that is our guys want to learn. When we plan our guys in a direction, our guys go.  It’s unbelievable.  That sounds so simple but it actually doesn’t happen in basketball with very many teams.  When our guys dig into a focus it might not be an immediate payoff in a day but over the course of a week or two weeks or a month.  These guys every single time answered the bell actually got better.  For us to be 40, 30.  For us to be 40, 30 and we are going to out offensive rebound them by one and we are going to hold two of the best offensive rebounders in the entire country, their starting five and backup five to only one offensive rebound between them.  That’s an epic effort by our guys and I’m really proud.  I’m saying that because we have so much respect for what Texas A&M does on the glass.  They are incredible on the glass.  The average 44% of their offense.  They offensive rebound 44% of the opportunities, that’s an insane number. And they came in as number one in the country.  

Q Mark, Texas A&M is a pretty tough opponent for Travis Perry to be forced to play maybe a little more.  Seems to be getting a little more comfortable and like maybe he gave you a spark early.

MARK POPE: TP, he’s terrific, isn’t he?  Again, really complicated defense.  This is not a really easy defense to figure out. What our guys are pretty good at is they are pretty good at figuring out what they are seeing we are pretty good about coaching them.  Things change as much as they do with Texas A&M and that’s the next step for us to be able to really change with the changes.  But TP, you know I mean it was big shots, really big shots. Right?  It made us feel a whole lot better.  He’s got no fear.  He’s just going out to play.  It’s fun.  If you chart his trajectory you get to see these little steps that he’s taking, we all get to see it.  It’s one of the great things about coaching and being fans that are really invested which is BBN is you get to actually see the beginning, the middle, and the growth that we get to prognosticate about where they are going and to see these guys grow is special and TP is definitely doing that.  This is a high-pressure game.  It’s a top 10 game against one of the best defenses in the country and he was terrific.  

Q Coach, in a game where there is plenty of opportunities for frustration to set in.  What prevented it from happening tonight?  

MARK POPE: Well, there’s a lot of frustration. That’s what Texas A&M does really well.  Our guys, you know that is something we will continue to work on all season long is just, you know our guys do a bunch of things.  One is there is so much good happening on the floor, like we felt good on the glass all night long. In fact in the first half we gave up two offensive rebounds in the first half minus two possessions where we gave up five offensive rebounds in those two positions. There was so much good for us to keep talking about in timeouts and to keep focusing on and I think when you keep focusing on what you are doing well, I think it gives you some staying power.  Our guys are pretty good about metabolizing frustration, they are pretty good at that.  Which is massively important.  If you are going to be a good team, you have to get rid of frustration.  You have to be able to absorb it and spit it out and our guys can do it.  

Q Mark, on the heels of that, how much of that is based on experience?  The amount of experience you have in veteran guys that have kind of been through these situations?  

MARK POPE: For sure it’s experience.  For sure is a huge part.  I would say that is secondary to our guys connectedness.  And their focus.  Our guys are unbelievably connected and that gives them staying power.  They care about each other, they want to fight for each other, they want to celebrate each other.  And that connectedness.  They want to help each other.  That connectedness really matters and our team’s ability to really focus on the challenge.  Like we know exactly what the challenge is. We know what the challenge is we are super frustrated right now.  Let’s get that out and let’s move onto the next thing. The guys focus is great and their experience is also a huge part of it.  

Q Mark, you mentioned even a couple of weeks ago talking about the offensive rebounding and the glass.  Even you guys as a coaching staff wondering if you are focusing too much on it in rectus or film and trying to get it to translate.  Over the last two games with Mississippi State and now A&M.  Was there something that you guys as coaches identified, changed, tweaked as coaches trying to implement that with your players or did it just finally resonate with them?  

MARK POPE: You know, growing is super complicated. Right?  We’ve put a huge emphasis on it. It is the Matt Santoro project.  You should all chase down Matt.  Matt has a staff; we usually have 12 segments in practice.  Seven of them will be live.  So, Matt live stats with his team and every single rebound that goes up and who is getting a hit.  Not just getting a rebound but actually doing their job, blocking out getting a hit.  And then he makes an announcement either on the loudspeaker here at Rupp.  He will be on the Jumbotron.  When we practice here it is quite entertaining.  And then in the JCC he has a megaphone.  I don’t know where he got this thing but credit to him, he got a megaphone.  He makes the announcement after every single segment.  We believe what you focus on broadens.  Our staff has done an unbelievable job about at the beginning cherry picking unbelievable efforts so our guys could see what it looks like to be successful.  And now it’s getting easy, now the guys are having fun with it.  Matt Santoro is handing out a formal certificate.  Our genius graphic designer, Addie Feldhaus is making these incredible certificates.  After every game, the hit champion.  On Thursday we will present the hit champion of this game with an official certificate.  Ansley Almonor is two for two.  We will see if he goes three straight games.  But I do, I think what you focus on broadens and our staff and our players are doing a great job with it, it’s pretty fun.  It’s really fun when you see these results.  

Q Mark, I know you live stats and numbers.  Here is one for you.  27 points the other day, 22 tonight.  It’s the most that Jaxson has ever scored in a two day stretch in his college career.  When you throw in who the two opponents were and throw in the eight rebounds tonight.  Does it feel like this is the best you’ve ever seen him play in kind of a consecutive game stretch?  

MARK POPE: I think it’s probably the most well-rounded I’ve seen him play. The 27 and 22 stand out.  One game on the road, one game here against two top 10 teams I think 14 or 11 give or take or something like that.  I don’t know. It’s really not the story.  It’s his contribution on the defensive end. He had a huge defensive play in the guts of the game where he had to pick up the point and Phelps is devastating off the bounce.  He caused Alabama, like I mean, when you watch the film he is causing so much frustration because he was getting downhill every time and Jaxson immediately jumped in and met him with the championship chest, took away the reject and was like this is fine.  He’s making plays like that consistently on the defensive end.  His blind cut from the corner late in the game four minutes, maybe five minutes late for the dunk was a huge play that was an IQ play for a space guy to actually be able to internalize the game and see when defenders are going blind and make that time up.  It’s those plays I think that is setting him apart.  It’s the eight rebounds, right?  That is the space.  It’s the resilience of missing his first three or four shots and you think man, was the other night just an anomaly and I’m going back to it.  He didn’t.  He’s like, nope.  I’m here to play.  I’m going to keep making plays.  So it is all of those pieces of his game that are pretty exciting, man.  Like I said, it’s awesome to watch guys growing up and a great honor and privilege to watch them grow up for three years.  

Q Mark, as part of the rebounding that you discussed earlier with Amari.  How much of that discussion involved going in attacking it with two hands?  It looks like that’s the best he’s done with that.  

MARK POPE: Yeah.  He looked like a man child on the glass, didn’t he?  My goodness, he was a man on the glass. I was really proud of him tonight.  It’s interesting, Amari has played at a much different level basketball for the last three years.  I think what’s fun right now is that he’s been given position by the whistle to actually use his physicality, which he couldn’t use at Drexel.  He was a much different deal, right?  It was like I’m playing against smaller guys, if I touch somebody they’re going to fall over.  I’m going to get a whistle.  This adjustment for him now where he’s like wait, I can run dudes over and it’s okay, like this gets fun.  I think he’s having a great time, man.  He’s fighting for his team.  We talked about this after the last game.  He loves this game. He’s just a ginormous, I know that’s not a word but I’m going to use it anyways.  But a ginormous heart.  I thought he was brilliant today. I thought he was so good.  He was just a commanding presence on the glass.  He was a man among men.  That was a bunch of men on the court today.  It was super cool.  Thanks guys.