Mark Pope won't use injuries as an excuse for Texas loss: "It's not acceptable."

If you want to give Kentucky a pass for losing at Texas because the injury bug has taken out the backcourt, Mark Pope wants you to demand more from this team. Not the team as it was constructed to open the season or even what it was last week, but how things look today — the version with Lamont Butler, Jaxson Robinson and Kerr Kriisa out.

That group of Wildcats held a five-point lead with 3:51 to go. From that point forward, the Longhorns went on a 14-1 run to take an eight-point lead with 34 seconds left on the clock. The wheels fell off in Austin and the collapse just wasn’t acceptable in Pope’s eyes, no matter who was out on the floor.

“We’re not leaving any space for that. Like, I have a good team,” he said. “The guys on the court are good players, and we’re good enough to win. These guys have proven that. We just didn’t do it in the last three minutes and 45 seconds tonight. That’s just it. It was tonight, and it’s super painful. It’s not acceptable. All those things are true.

“We have the guys we need to win, and we’re going to figure out a way to do it. We did it for 36 minutes, we just couldn’t do it for the last four. That’s just the truth. That’s just the fact. We’ll lean into the facts right now.”

Kentucky shot just 41.9 percent from the field and 25.0 percent from three with six 3-pointers — although two came in the final 18 seconds. There were three makes in the first half, then one with 17 minutes to go before that late stretch when the game was all over but the shouting.

When asked about how much the lineups impacted the Wildcats down the stretch and whether they dealt with physical and/or mental fatigue with the rotation tightened, Pope once again refused to accept any excuses for the loss.

With Butler and Robinson out, Travis Perry and Trent Noah combined for 49 minutes, plus another 23 from Ansley Almonor. Those guys are good enough, their coach believes with total confidence.

“We’re just not spending any time on that. We have really good players,” Pope said. “Travis Perry stepped up and really battled like crazy tonight. Trent Noah is doing unbelievable work. These guys that are filling in spots are doing — they’re really, really good players. We’re good enough to win.

“We’re not allowing any space for any of that. We have a good team, we’re good enough to win. We were good enough to win for 36 minutes tonight, and we’ll get good enough to win in the last four.”

It’s not a catch-all deal where you’re also minimizing the value guys like Butler, Robinson and Kriisa bring to the table. That’s certainly not the case. Pope just wants to make it clear Kentucky is good enough to win games like this one with the nine players who took the floor in blue and white at the Moody Center in Austin. It doesn’t matter the positions or new roles, they’re good enough.

“Certainly, there’s some new stuff, for sure. Certainly some guys are in new positions they haven’t been in, for sure, but this group is good enough to win,” Pope continued. “We’ll figure that part out. We’re going to get there.”

A tough, but avoidable loss in Pope’s eyes. That last segment will be keeping the Kentucky head coach up the next couple of nights.