Mark Pope explains why Amari Williams doesn't play more for Kentucky

Amari Williams is trending toward obvious All-SEC status, dominating at his position in the strongest conference in college basketball. He’s averaging 11.0 points, 8.8 rebounds, 3.0 assists and 1.4 blocks per game overall, but 14.0 points, 9.4 rebounds and 3.9 assists per contest over his last eight in league play — five double-doubles and one triple-double in that span.

In that same stretch, though, he’s played no more than 27 minutes and as few as 21. It’s led to a conversation about Williams’ elite production and how much more he could give if he played well into the 30s instead of capping his time on the floor at 30 while averaging just 22.1 minutes per game on the year.

Mark Pope sees where you’re coming from — he’d play his star center 40 minutes per game if he could. It’s not as simple as leaving him out on the floor and expecting his production to remain the same, though. They’ve crunched the numbers and have found that Williams’ efficiency takes a serious hit when he’s in the game too long.

“What we’ve seen is efficiency drops, actually, when Amari is off the floor, and it also drops when Amari is on the floor a little bit too long,” Pope said Monday night. “Amari was unbelievable at Alabama, he was terrific. But as he gets stretched and stretched and stretched, you start to see cracks with what he’s able to do energy-wise. We saw some of that with some mistakes, leaning into fatigue late in the game.”

As brilliant as Williams was, finishing with 17 points, 11 rebounds and six assists in 27 minutes, his four turnovers came in the second half with three of them coming in the final eight minutes. When he gets winded, the mistakes pile up and he’s not the same dominant force he was with fresh legs.

That’s why he’s hit the 30-minute mark just one time at Kentucky and has exceeded that threshold just 10 times in his entire five-year career at the DI level.

“He’s operating at his very best when he’s kind of in that space,” Pope said. “He’s most efficient and most effective and most impactful when he can be in that, somewhere between that — 20 to 28 minutes is a real stretch for any guy his size.”

As well as he moves and how much he creates as a point center in this offense, it’s sometimes easy to forget he is a 7-footer who weighs 262 pounds. Comparing his minutes to a guard a fraction of his height and weight is apples to oranges.

That’s why they’re comfortable in this current space with Williams giving what he’s able to give, no matter how obvious it is that Kentucky is better with him on the floor than off.

“He’s doing something no other player in college basketball is doing right now. His responsibility is so huge,” Pope said. “We also have talented players behind him, we’re trying to find that exact right space where he can play the most minutes, where he can be the most effective.

“We’re not playing him so many minutes where there’s a drop-off. That’s a little bit of a project, and he’s been doing a great job so far.”

It’s about getting the guys behind Williams to step up as much as it is expecting more out of the 7-foot, 262-pound center.