Cardiac Cats Survive in Cancun!

Twelve years ago, Kentucky and Stanford last met in an epic overtime battle in which the 1998 "Comeback Cats" came back from a double digit deficit to defeat the Cardinal in the Final Four in San Antonio.

This time, the Cats and Cardinal met again even further south than the Alamo, in Cancun, Mexico. Scott Padgett made clutch shots in the '98 game. This time, he sat on the bench on John Calipari's coaching staff in another overtime thriller between the two schools. John Wall, Eric Bledsoe, and Ramon Harris all made clutch plays down the stretch and Darius Miller added 10 points as the Cats outscored Stanford 10-2 in overtime to win it once again.

Patrick Patterson had limited playing time in the first half due to early foul trouble, but the Junior All-American came back and played strong in the second half while posting yet another double double, the 25th of his career, with 12 points and 11 rebounds. Demarcus Cousins had a solid 13 points and 3 blocks, but made a crucial freshman mistake late in the game that could have been costly for the Cats. Down by 2 at the line, Cousins missed the first free throw with about 10 seconds remaining on the clock. He then proceeded to miss the second free throw on purpose and tried to rebound it to get another shot to tie the game. This was foolish because if he had just made the free throw, Kentucky could foul immediately. Cousins was immediately pulled from the game and chewed out by Coach Cal on the sidelines. Even if Stanford made both free throws, it would be a three point game with plenty of time for UK to tie it up with a three. Now, Stanford could clinch the game if they could make both free throws.

Luckily for the Cats, they missed both free throws and Kentucky rebounded the ball still down by 2 with 9 seconds left. It was now time for John Wall to bail out his buddy Demarcus and take over to save the day for the Cats. He drove to the basket and was fouled with 2.4 seconds left. He nailed both free throws to tie the game up and finished the game with 24 points, including a perfect 8 for 8 from the line. Overtime belonged to the Cats as Eric Bledsoe stabbed the dagger on the Cardinal with a devastating NBA-range three pointer with 33 seconds left in OT to seal the deal for the Cats as they escaped Cancun with an unblemished 6-0 record, only seven wins away from becoming the nation's first program to reach 2,000 all-time victories.

Happy Thanksgiving! Go Cats! Let's FINALLY beat Tennessee!

(Photo's courtesy of bigbluehistory.net and the Associated Press)