Despite dropping to 5-10 this year, UK coach John Calipari told reporters after Kentucky’s 70-59 defeat in Alabama on Tuesday night that a path to the NCAA tournament was still at stake for the Wildcats, even without the SEC tournament.
“Yes, it is (too early to be concerned) because we have all kinds of games left. We will have six or seven qualified teams, ”said Calipari. “What happens if Terrence (Clarke) comes back and suddenly we are a different team? My belief is that we will just put ourselves in a better position. “
Just three days later, Kentucky had its game against No. 5 Texas in the Big 12 / SEC Challenge scheduled for Saturday night canceled due to a combination of positive tests, contact tracking and subsequent quarantine of individuals within the program. The team is now on a 48-hour break, with next week’s games at No. 12 Missouri and against No. 18 Tennessee officially on the air.
Although the SEC is determined to reschedule any conference games postponed due to COVID-19, non-conference scheduling is no longer a priority. Canceled means canceled, reducing the total number of Kentucky regular season games to 24 in the year, 25 if the team’s postponed game against South Carolina is rescheduled.
Calipari’s statement of “all other game types” was simply not true at the time, and is even more wrong now. With a maximum of only ten games remaining on the schedule, math isn’t adding up to a run for the NCAA Tournament without the help of a SEC title played in Nashville, especially when you consider the team’s current inability to recite wins consecutive and gain momentum.
The UK tournament odds were minimal for the Texas game. Now, it will take a lot of magic to have a chance.
How is this magic? Let’s look at the scenarios.
Regular season
As I collapsed last week before Kentucky’s trip to Georgia, the UK’s magic number has been around 15 wins to close the regular season, a difficult task before the Wildcats were defeated by Georgia and Alabama in two of the team’s last three games. Why 15?
No team in the past 11 years – during Calipari’s entire term in the UK – has won a general bid with a winning percentage worse than 0.558. These teams – Florida (2019), Alabama (2018), Vanderbilt (2017) – each ended with 19-15 final records.
While these win totals are not possible for the UK right now (and I hope they don’t reach those loss totals either), the Wildcats needed to end the regular season at around 15-11 overall to stay above the minimum 0.558 mark just to take a chance. Now that the total number of games has dropped to 25 in the year, here are the winning percentages updated above and below this minimum threshold:
- 15 wins, 10 losses = 0.600
- 14 wins, 11 losses = 0.560
- 13 wins, 12 losses = 0.520
- 12 wins, 13 losses = 0.480
This brings us to the first part of the post-season game.
SEC Tournament
Kentucky’s margin of error is clearly small and the odds are unlikely at the moment. But if the Wildcats start to close the regular season and are still in contention for a general bid, this is where things are about to reach a minimum winning percentage of 0.558.
With 15 wins, 10 losses …
With 14 wins, 11 losses …
- One loss (14-12) = 0.538
- One victory, one defeat (15-12) = 0.556
- Two wins, one loss (16-12) = 0.571
With 13 wins, 12 losses …
- One loss (13-13) = 0.500
- One victory, one defeat (14-13) = 0.519
- Two wins, one loss (15-13) = 0.536
- Three wins, one loss (16-13) = 0.552
- Four wins, one loss (17-13) = 0.567
With 12 wins, 13 losses …
- One loss (12-14) = 0.462
- One victory, one defeat (13-14) = 0.481
- Two wins, one loss (14-14) = 0.500
- Three wins, one loss (15-14) = 0.517
- Four wins, one loss (16-14) = 0.553
In a typical SEC tournament key, the maximum number of wins that the lowest ranked seed can win without winning the title is four, since the fifth game is the championship. Winning five games secures the SEC title, thus giving the team an automatic offer for the NCAA Tournament.
In short, 13 or more defeats in the regular season means the SEC Tournament title or burst.
Calipari era wrong saying Kentucky isn’t counting on a SEC title to do the NCAA Tournament? Not technically. But looking at recent history with free throws, there is very little margin of error for Kentucky at this point. It can be so fragile that earning ten straight to end the regular season may be the only way to feel comfortable securing an offer.
Calipari took many rabbits out of his hat over his time in Lexington, but he will need to do his biggest trick so far to get this team to Big Dance.