When you plan for the unexpected of the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament, what you need is some unexpected of your own.
On the way to a 19-4 record overall, including an 8-2 SEC mark, this now No. 5-ranked and moving up Kentucky basketball team is finding the unexpected, the unexpected positive.
In UK's 66-55 win at Alabama on Saturday night, it was Daimion Collins, the slender 6-foot-10 freshman from Atlanta, Texas, who had played all of 25 minutes in the Wildcats' eight previous SEC games. Collins hadn't even seen the floor in UK's last two games, the 80-62 blowout win at Kansas on Jan. 29 or the nip-and-tuck 77-70 victory over Vanderbilt at Rupp Arena on Feb. 2.
And yet there was Collins at Coleman Coliseum — surprise, surprise — jumping on his pogo stick to score 10 points and grab six rebounds in nine minutes of action. That's right — 10 points and six rebounds in nine minutes. Talk about efficiency.
"The difference-maker," said UK Coach John Calipari, who was jolted awake Friday night with the thought of what lobs could do to the Alabama defense and just who on his roster could catch those lobs.
"Everyone in the program knows what he can do," said teammate TyTy Washington of Collins. "He's 6-10 with a 45-inch vertical."
Collins is also the latest in a growing line of current Kentucky players who have popped up off the bench to help the Cats' cause at key times.
Against Vanderbilt, it was reserve guard Damion Mintz who snapped out of a 6-for-26 shooting slump to knock down 21 points against the Commodores. Mintz was 6-of-11 from the floor, 4-of-7 from three-point range and the winning team's leading scorer.
At Kansas, it was reserve center Lance Ware who scored four points and grabbed four rebounds in 10 minutes, while giving Oscar Tshiebwe a well-deserved break, especially in the first half, as the Cats rolled to their here-we-are statement win over the Jayhawks.
At home against Mississippi State, it was reserve guard Dontaie Allen who gave the Cats 18 much-needed minutes while TyTy Washington was out with an ankle injury and Sahvir Wheeler encountered first-half foul trouble. The Cats managed to beat back the Bulldogs 82-74 in overtime.
At Texas A&M, it was reserve forward Jacob Toppin who scored nine points, grabbed six rebounds and dished two assists in 23 minutes during the Wildcats' grind-it-out 64-58 victory over the Aggies in College Station.
"The other guy we gotta get in, but he's gotta earn more minutes is Bryce (Hopkins)," said Calipari on Saturday of his freshman forward.
"Options" is the key word here. Calipari has a dependable five in his starting lineup, but as the coach says, they're not robots. One or two are bound to have an off night at any time. They key is to have options the head coach can trust when one or more of the starters are not on his game.
It's even better to have different options, players that step up at different times to meet the moment. Enter Collins. Calipari operates with a three-guard lineup to go along with the 6-foot-7 Keion Brooks at the four spot and Tshiebwe at center. What he has needed is another so-called big who can spell or complement the rebounding machine he has at center.
"Now he has forced me to figure out how to play him," Calipari said of Collins. "Now it's on me."
Actually, it's on everyone. As the Cats have proved over these past couple of weeks, they are a legitimate national championship contender. Math maven Ken Pomeroy had Kentucky No. 3 in his overall efficiency rankings heading into Sunday, just behind Gonzaga and Arizona.
To win it all, however, you have to win six straight games. And to win six straight games, you have to have players who can step up and meet the moment. The more of those players the better.
"You need all the weapons you can have because you don't know," Calipari said Saturday. "When you have that kind of depth, you have a lot of room for error."
