No. 23 Kentucky 80, Arkansas 66

“We may be a grind-it-out team”. Well, that’s not on him. Now, he’s got to get in better shape, he can’t stay out there long.

“Whatever is holding you back from high-energy play, you gotta figure it out, ” he said earlier this week. But he had confidence because he made a couple shots. “I didn’t give it to him”. I’m trying to everything to figure out what is this team. “We’re facing teams that are playing like their lives depend on it. We’ve got to be a desperate team also”. Jamal and Isaiah still gotta learn to win. “At the very least, they give you five fouls (each)”. But it was a good win. Tyler Ulis has been a prominent voice in practice this week for the Wildcats, and the team seemed to display some of his aggressiveness from the opening tip in this one. “He was really, really, really good”. Kentucky won 43-34, but the advantage was built largely early on with offensive rebounds. I wasn’t sure. So I had? OK.

“This is a hard place”, Calipari said.

It hasn’t been easy this season for Skal Labissiere, the Kentucky freshman who arrived on campus ranked No. 1 in the 2015 recruiting class and with the expectations of a fan base used to winning with one-and-dones on his shoulders. Look, we may be a grind-it-out team.

· Kentucky led by as much as 18, 63-45, with 9:15 to play. We raced if we had it, and if we didn’t have it, we tried to grind it out. “We’re scrimmaging, just playing against each other and compete and know what’s going to win us the game”. Just how it is. They shot like 15 percent from the floor.

Kentucky stretched it back out to 14, but Hannahs made a floater just before the buzzer to make it 36-24. “We were trying to get some momentum”. “They’re excited to play us but we have to have more excitement and more energy to them, especially going into their building”. “That’s what I play for or else I probably wouldn’t play this game, honestly, anymore”.

“Maybe he’s a jump-shooting big man”, he said. But if you think it sounds like idle coachspeak, think again.

Memorable moment: Calipari was seen celebrating on the sideline after Labissiere threw down a huge second-half dunk. On Thursday, he took a major step forward in helping prove them all right.

The guards of Kentucky went an abysmal 0-for-11 from the field to begin the game for Kentucky, until Jamal Murray was able to break the slump. That really was a boost, i thought, helped Kentucky push their lead out. “You have a responsibility, too, to do your job on this team”.

Willis earned the start Thursday night off more than his strong performance at Auburn, Calipari said. Before Hawk went down with his high ankle sprain, there’s no question he was closer to earning a starting spot that Willis, even if they play different positions. He was the leading rebounder in two days of practice. Because he had two tipped-back balls that he fumbled for no reason. They outrebounded Arkansas by nine and outscored them on second-chance points by 11. That was big for us. “And we always had someone either switching out on (Hannahs) or always around them….” And given their current inside struggles, he said it’s time to play Humphries and Wynyard more.

The coach was hardly the only one visibly frustrated after the game. There is still time to turn things around, but there are a lot of questions surrounding the program. For Arkansas it was the whole time. “I mean, I’m not trying to act like I did anything, but that’s what our plan was”.

Labissiere was quieter in the second half, but he had a highlight-reel play when he and Ulis ran a pick-and-roll to perfection.

On the icy postgame exchange with him and Anderson: “It’s fine”. “So when I talk about winning basketball, it matters”.