Troy has 'all the respect for Kentucky' -- but eyes upset: "We've got to come out there and take it."

Troy is obviously celebrating its Sun Belt championship to punch a ticket to the NCAA Tournament, earning the opportunity to travel to Milwaukee to take on No. 3 seed Kentucky on college basketball’s biggest stage — it doesn’t get any better than that for a mid-major out of Alabama, right? On paper, sure. The Trojans are grateful to be in this position, but they’re not coming for a participation trophy.

They’re in March Madness to create some madness, eyeing the upset as a double-digit underdog to send the Wildcats home as one-and-dones for the third time in four years.

“This is what you live for and what you dream about, and so the opportunity to go out there and play them, I know our guys are excited and ready for the challenge,” Troy head coach Scott Cross said.

There are some potential advantages on the table, the Trojans have found. The biggest? Continuity, coming in ranked No. 10 nationally in that category with returning talent and experience all over the floor. Kentucky, on the other hand, ranks No. 355 nationally with a turnstile of pieces in and out of the lineup all season long due to injury. Where the Wildcats are scrambling to find some consistency on the floor with core guys, the Trojans have been among the most consistent groups in the country.

They hope that chemistry pays off inside Fiserv Forum.

“A stat that our coaches told us was that Kentucky is bottom 10 or something like that in the country in minutes continuity because they’ve had a lot of injuries and they’ve got a lot of new guys playing together, a lot of transfers and whatnot,” Troy forward Thomas Dowd said. “This team, we had 12 guys come back from last year and we’ve started pretty much the same lineup every game, we have the same rotations every game. Thank the Lord that there’s not been any really severe injuries to the team. That’s definitely something that we think we kind of have on our side. We know who we’re playing with and we feel really comfortable playing with each other.”

They may lack continuity in terms of minutes and returning talent, but they make up for it in talent — and the Trojans know that. The Wildcats didn’t win eight top-15 games this season by accident, tying college basketball’s all-time record.

For Troy to pull off the unthinkable, the ball is going to have to bounce its way with some real March Madness luck.

“They’re a tough team, you know? I mean, they had a couple of upsets early, but I know that they’re going to come out and not give us anything,” second-leading scorer Myles Rigsby said. “We’ve got to come out there and take it.”

“They’ve got great shooters, they’ve got great size and great athletes,” junior Marcus Rigsby Jr. added. “They’re a good overall team. We’re just trying to find out any weaknesses we can and exploit those, hopefully get this win.”

They’ll have to find some advantages where they can — and they’ve got a couple in mind.

“We already knew there was a chance we’d be matched up with them. We’ve been really good at offensive rebounding all year, and we’ve been really good at turning teams over all year,” Dowd said. “We know that those are two things that Kentucky has struggled with a little bit all year, so we’ve really got to capitalize on those. What our coaches have just been telling us is that we just have to be the same team we’ve been all year. We’ve been good at those things all year, so really don’t change anything. Just go out there and be who we are. …

“Obviously, we have all the respect for Kentucky. They’re a really good team with really good players. We know they’ve gone through a lot of injuries this year, so we’re just ready to go out there with the utmost confidence and give it our all.”

What’s going to be the difference in a Troy upset on Friday night?

“I would say our toughness and grit, you know? Our offensive crashing, sharing the ball and just being us, honestly. Being us, that’s pretty much it,” Rigsby Jr. said.

“Staying together, being one as a team. Not letting the outside affect us and just staying in the game,” Rigsby added. “… Obviously, we’re going to put confidence in all of our guys. I feel like it’s at a pretty good level right now. We’re just ready.”

Above all else, the Trojans hope to prove to the basketball world they not only belong on the same floor as the Wildcats, but that they can win.

They may not know about Troy basketball now, but they will by the end of the night.

“They’re the pinnacle of the basketball world as a program, Kentucky is,” Dowd said. “Just the opportunity to get out there and play against them — the fanbase is huge and the rest of college basketball cares about Kentucky, because they’re always one of the best in the country. We know that this is an amazing opportunity for each of us to get out there and show our abilities, individually and, more specifically, as a team.

“A lot of people probably don’t know what Troy is about, and we’re just looking at it as an opportunity to showcase our abilities.”