Mark Pope’s woeful timeout strategy is something everyone is finally waking up to. For whatever reason, Pope simply does not like calling timeouts, and on Tuesday night in College Station, that stubbornness cost Kentucky a game they once controlled.
A “bystander” approach to a 27-3 collapse
Kentucky held a 30-18 lead with 8 minutes to go in the first half after a Malachi Moreno layup. From that point until the halftime buzzer, the Cats made exactly one more field goal. During what ended up being a 27-3 run over the last eight minutes of the half, Mark Pope called just one timeout.
When have you ever seen a Kentucky team allow a 27-3 run without the coach burning every timeout in his pocket to stop the bleeding? It didn’t end there, either. The collapse stretched into a 36-6 nightmare before Pope finally signaled for another break.
Watching from the sideline…