Cats have Cards for lunch in the Yum! Center

When Kentucky and Louisville take the court you know it’s going to be a great game. Today’s match up was no different. It was a great game but the Wildcats come out with a huge victory over the Cards 78-63.

This game came with several surprises with a career high double-double play from big man Josh Harrellson had 23 points and 14 rebounds. This was a huge deal as he normal averages about 5 points per game and only scored 28 total points last season. He has really stepped up into this leadership role on this team as he is the only senior on the roster and is the only big man with big man Enes Kanter being ruled ineligible to play by the NCAA.

As it was last season this team is lead by a group of incredible freshmen talent which has two of the teams leading scorers. They showed up to play against the Cards as Brandon Knight had an outstanding game scoring 25 points and Terrence Jones had 12 points, eight rebounds and six assist. This group of freshmen have really stepped up since the loss to North Carolina on ways of their game they are playing better defense as well as offense and are really looking good as they are about to enter SEC play.

As for Louisville they came out early hitting the three but that did not last as they went eight for 20 from three-point line. The Cards was out match on all levels they got beat in every category from field-goals to rebounds they just could not play with this Wildcat squad. They did get some good play out of Preston Knowles who scored 22 points which is above his season average of 15.2 points per game.

This game set a record attendance for the new KFC Yum! Center with 22,803 people. This is the first year of the new arena and it will play host to many more great games between the two rivals for years to come.

With the win over Louisville this puts Coach Calipari 2-0 in the battle of the bluegrass and puts the Wildcats 11-2 on the season.

The next match up for the Wildcats will be Monday against Penn in Rupp Arena at 7:00 PM EST.

Cats Lose a Quarterback for Bowl

As the Kentucky Wildcats are preparing for their fifth straight bowl appearance they will do so without starting quarterback Mike Hartline, after being arrested early Friday morning.

Hartline was taken into custody outside a Lexington bar and was charged with second-degree disorderly conduct, alcohol intoxication in a public place and failure to notify the department of transportation of an address change.

After news of the arrest got to head coach Joker Phillips he went on to suspend Hartline from what would be his last game in a Wildcats uniform.

“Mike Hartline has had a good record here conduct-wise, and I regret that this happened,” Phillips said. “I really hate that it happened because of what he did, leading this program to our fifth straight bowl, and he’s done a great job at that. But we have clear expectations for how we want our players to act and for them to behave.”

This has been a big blow to the Wildcats going into the BBVA Compass Bowl without Hartline. He started all 12 of Kentucky’s games this season and put up some of his best numbers in senior season. So far on the year he is ranked sixth in the SEC and 24th nationally, in pass efficiency. Hartline also lead the Cats to a 6-6 record.

Since Hartline will not be allowed to play the Cats will look to Sophomore Morgan Newton to take the reins and lead them to a victory. Newton has thrown seven successful passes on season and will be expected to get the start.

The Wildcats will take the field on January 8 against Pittsburgh who has had problems of their own in the firing of former head coach Dave Wannsted after six seasons there.

After Long Day Sox Sign Gonzalez

December 5, 2010 may go down as one of the most stressful but exciting days for fans of the Boston Red Sox. This is the day that the biggest trade in recent history went down sending first baseman Adrian Gonzalez to the Red Sox by trade but it almost didn’t happen.

All trade talks began on Saturday saying that Gonzalez had been traded from the San Diego Padres for three of Boston’s top minor league prospects, which included Casey Kelly a right-handed pitcher and was considered there top prospect. It was said the only way the deal would go through was if Gonzalez, who is coming into his final year of his contract, was willing to sign a contract extension allowing him to skip free agency and become of a long term member of the team.

The two sides began to negotiate a long term contract with a 2pm ET deadline on Sunday to get a deal complete. Both sides worked long into the night and Red Sox Nation began to worry if a deal would get done. It was said that Gonzalez camp was requesting a six year deal worth $150 million and the Red Sox are not known for signing players over five year deal due to injury or age.

Well the 2pm deadline comes and goes, the fans are nervously waiting to see if a deal had been agreed upon between the two camps.

When a tweet from SI.com’s Jon Heyman came out saying that the “Gonzalez trade had feel thru”. Peter Gammons also added that Gonzalez was leaving Boston on a 4:30 flight and had left a hundred million dollar deal on the table.

At this point the hearts of all Boston fans was broken as some fans were calling for the firing of General Manager Theo Epstein and saying that John W. Henry should sell the team if he wasn’t willing to spend money on winning players. This would be the second time they was unable to finish a deal as they lost in the bidding two years before on first baseman Mark Teixeira to the New York Yankees.

Later in the day as hearts of broken fans sit around to hear from the team sources come out to say what had happened. Rumors began to surface that the two sides was still working on a deal past the deadline deal. This began to bring hope back.
Then at around the 9 pm ET, out of nowhere Heyman sends out a tweet saying that a deal had been completed sending Gonzalez to the Red Sox. This was not the deal Boston had originally wanted and the deal was done without contract extension that they had hoped for.

With all the speculations over of will he or won’t he play in Boston, Monday morning the deal became official in a press conference. Gonzalez said that as a boy his favorite American League team growing up was the Boston Red Sox.
“I’m very excited,” Gonzalez said. “I’ve had five incredible years in San Diego. When I grew up, my whole dream as a kid was to play in the major leagues and be a Padre. My second dream was to be a Red Sox. So, I’m very excited. God has been very, very good to me, and I’m just very excited to start this new phase. I look forward to a lot of world championships.”

Boston fans couldn’t have said it better than that; he is being brought in as a bat that has been missing in the lineup since the trade of Manny Ramirez in 2008.

Since a deal is not in place as of yet he is currently under contract his original contract for one year for a bargain of $5.5 million. It is said that the Red Sox and Gonzalez have common ground and they feel that a deal can be done at a later date. Some believe that a deal will not come from the Red Sox until after Opening Day so to avoid any luxury taxes on the 2011 pay roll.

So now that it is all said and done Gonzalez will take the field on April1, 2011 as the starting first baseman for the Red Sox, the fans can now be excited for the future of the team and no longer be calling for Epstein’s head because of his success.