A list limited to Kentucky basketball play small until his three seven-footers are available to participate. Associate head coach Orlando Antigua called them Kentucky’s “21-footers” during Tuesday press conferencereferring to injured centers Aaron Bradshaw And Ugonna Onyenso and newcomer Zvonimir Ivisicwhich is awaiting authorization from the NCAA.
Waiting for, Tre Mitchell is the only Wildcat taller than six-foot-eight on the roster, so the transfer forward from West Virginia is the closest thing to a big man. At 6-9, Mitchell plays more of a face-up game with the ability to extend the defense rather than doing his job through and over the opposing size and length inside.
Still, Mitchell was outstanding in the preseason against Georgetown, going 9 of 12 from the field for 22 points and nine rebounds. Both hit highs for either team last Friday night, leading Coach O to rave about Mitchell on Tuesday.
Antigua said: “He has so many levels to his game. You just get to see a little bit of it.
READ MORE: ‘He’s a connector’: How Tre Mitchell fills Kentucky’s 21-foot void
Jordan Burks and Adou Thiero play big
When Mitchell needs rest or finds himself struggling, Kentucky will turn to a freshman first. Jordan Burks at five ‘o’ clock. Listed as a guard on Kentucky’s official roster, Burks is the six-foot-eight backup center.
Against Georgetown College in the team’s first exhibition game, Burks was asked to play bigger as the Wildcats lacked size inside. He responded with six rebounds in 20 minutes coming off the bench, and three of the six offensive rebounds led to second-chance shots.
On Tuesday, Antigua said of the versatile Kentucky freshman: “We absolutely love everything Jordan has given us. He’s doing an outstanding job and learning a position he hasn’t played much, and that just adds value to him and what he does for us.
“His energy, his motor, his length. He’s another guy that can go out and block shots, chase rebounds, chase shots. So all those things are a plus for us, and he gives us a certain spark when he’s on the field.
When Burks plays big without Mitchell, it likely displaces his 6-foot-8 compatriot Adou Théro to the four. Or, in some cases, even in first year Justin Edwardsthe 200-pound freshman wing.
“Now you get really fast and really dangerous,” Antigua said of small-ball lineups.
However, there is an urgency to the emergency scenario in which Kentucky has neither Mitchell nor Burks for short periods of time. In that case, Antigua says Kentucky would look to Thiero to anchor its five-out defense and offense.
“Even if Adou had to play five,” he said. “Now, okay, this becomes another type of game that people have to deal with.”
Adou at 5?!
Adou Thiero’s offseason transformation was a popular topic during the trip from Kentucky to Canada this summer. At the time, Thiero had grown three inches and added more than 35 pounds since his first orientation, plus an increase of almost five inches to his vertical.
“Adou is still growing, man“, Antigua said on Tuesday. “It’s scary to think he’s still growing. He’s still shaping his body, you know, he’s blessed with genetic genes that none of us have anything to do with. He just has to work at it and he did.
“We’re going to ask a lot of things from him as someone who now has to step in and play multiple positions, a guy who can play, honestly, one through five if you needed to.”
