The Team That Will Beat Kentucky

"Which team can beat Kentucky?" is the question du jour, du semaine, du Mars, it being Folie du Mars after all.

The answer, from the self-proclaimed Cognoscenti of College Cagers, is a team that matches up well with the Wildcats, that can answer Lexington's trees with timberland of their own, that can "break down" the big blue defense, or "play long" or "dictate the pace" or whatever patter is en vogue in hoops today.

The teams invariably mentioned are other top dogs of the NCAA this year like Wisconsin and Duke.

But it's obvious to a casual observer that these are patently misguided, by two Scientologists and Lois Lerner's emails.

Certainly Kentucky has less of a margin against better teams. That's so obvious the person picking her bracket based on mascot names could tell you it. The Wildcats can beat a #16 seed despite playing their worst game, something they can't do against a top seed.

But beyond that, the recipe for beating Kentucky, or any team with more talent than yours, is not a particular style of play. It's good play, a hot hand and some luck.

A team will beat Kentucky when several of of the following occur:
1. The underdog hits their shots, particularly their three-point shots. There's no defense against shots that go in the basket.
2. Kentucky doesn't shoot well.
3. The underdog stays out of foul trouble.
4. A couple of key Wildcats have to sit.
5. The underdog pulls down defensive rebounds, thereby keeping Kentucky from multiple shots at the basket each time down.
6. The underdog wins a few extra 50-50 balls.
7. A couple of questionable calls go the underdog's way.
8. Kentucky has bad juju that day.

We've seen it before. No one would cite Missisissippi (play-in game), Texas A&M (NIT) and LSU (#9 seed) as Most Likely To Succeed against John Calipari's squad. But each of them pushed Kentucky to within Donald Trump's intellect of defeat, two of them going to overtime and one losing by a bucket. Had one more trey fallen during those games this whole line of banter would be moot.

So the question isn't who can beat Kentucky. It's how.