Calipari compares Oscar Tshiebwe vs. Drew Timme to Marcus Camby vs. Tim Duncan

With the win over SC State now over and done with, it’s finally time to focus on Gonzaga. Sunday night’s showdown in Spokane lost a little luster following Kentucky’s loss to Michigan State and the Bulldogs’ 19-point loss to Texas, but (for now) it’s still a matchup of two top-five teams and their elite big men, Oscar Tshiebwe and Drew Timme.

In his postgame press conference, John Calipari was asked about Oscar vs. Timme. He compared it to another battle of two great bigs, Marcus Camby and Tim Duncan, in December 1995 while he was coaching at UMass. UMass beat Wake Forest 60-46. Camby finished with 17 points and 9 rebounds to Duncan’s 9 points and 12 rebounds.

“I’ve had this before. It was Marcus Camby and Tim Duncan. We played Wake Forest, those two played. You would have thought no one else was in the game and there were no coaches. It was one-on-one, I’m telling you. Now it ended up the score being [60-46] I believe, and I’ve been wrong before I think it was 1978, ’77 but it ended up not being, neither one — they played okay. But the hype of that was ridiculous. So I’ve been through it.”

Even though Oscar and Timme will surely go to war on the court, Calipari made sure to point out that off it, the two are friends after bonding at various national player of the year award events. Still, Calipari can’t wait for the two — and Kentucky and Gonzaga — to steal some of the spotlight on NFL Sunday.

“I don’t think, like Oscar — they like each other. I’ve been at events with them. They both like each other. And Mark Few and I, he and I talk once a week, once every two weeks. It’s going to be a great challenge. It’ll be a hard game. In Spokane, 14,000 [fans]. I’m getting calls from all over the place. ‘I live in Montana. Could you get me tickets? I’ll drive over.’ I mean, it’s — I can’t even imagine. And I love it’s on an NFL Sunday. Perfect. Let’s go. What do you want to watch, Steelers? Or are you going to watch us?”

Oscar played limited minutes vs. SC State

After playing 34 minutes in his season debut vs. Michigan State, Oscar took it easy tonight, coming off the bench to put up 6 points and 7 rebounds in 14 minutes. Calipari initially wanted to rest Oscar for the Gonzaga game, but after watching the tape from the Michigan State game, decided against it.

“We weren’t going to play him today. But the reason we played him is, it’s a different game for the rest of our players when he’s in. One of the things we did a really poor job of vs. Michigan State is post-feeding. Now, you tell me why that would have happened. We aren’t posting the ball when he’s not in there. Now all of a sudden, he’s in there and you’re trying to post it and you’re not a good post passer. We worked on that yesterday and today at the shootaround, how to throw it and make sure you’re ready to get it to the post. And you ready? Where you space to. We hadn’t thrown it to the post. I needed him out there today just so we get — we gotta be a team and play together.”

The fact that Oscar was able to put up six points and seven rebounds in only 14 minutes speaks to his ability. His streak of 17 double-doubles was snapped tonight, a sacrifice Calipari said Oscar was happy to make for his team.

“We’re gonna give him off and I said, ‘Why don’t you play? You know, five, eight minutes a half.’ Now, what about that makes him really unselfish? Stats. Yeah, okay. You’re gonna play 12 minutes and you want to be the leading rebounder in the country and all and you accept doing that? That means you’re unselfish. You’re about your team. Because I left it up to him. I said, ‘You’re not gonna play more than 18-15 minutes.’ And then I said, ‘Do you want to start the second half, play five or six, and then I’ll take you out. So I don’t know exactly what he played. 13 minutes. Think about that. Player of the year in the country, has 20 [points] and 18 [rebounds] first game and he says, ‘Yeah, let me play less.'”