'I'm coaching fearless today.' John Calipari, players talk win over Cats

When a coach returns for the first time wearing opposing colors to the place where he spent the bulk of his hall of fame career — with three transfers and three recruits once committed to that place no less — emotions were bound to be high. They evidently were high enough to propel John Calipari's struggling Arkansas Razorbacks (13-8, 2-6 SEC) to a much-needed 89-79 win in Rupp Arena on Saturday in Lexington, Kentucky over the Kentucky Wildcats (15-6, 4-4 SEC).

Everything John Calipari and players said after the Kentucky win

Emotional ride for former Cats

"When we came to the time, if you feel like (Coach Calipari) is going too crazy, come over here and tell (him), like, calm down because you're good," said sophomore point-guard DJ Wagner. "So that's just something I was just telling him. Like, just calm down. We're good."

Wagner, who has followed Calipari since being recruited by the coach as the No. 1 high school player in the country two seasons ago, responded with his best performance as a Razorback with 17-points and eight assists to go with three rebounds in the game. Fellow Kentucky transfers Adou Thiero (21 points, eight rebounds and three steals), Zvonimir Ivisic (14 points and four rebounds) and freshman Karter Knox (10 points and four rebounds) joined Wagner with double-figure scoring efforts.

"I kinda kinda got my emotions out of the way last night when we came in," said Theiro who leads the Razorbacks on the season in points, rebounds and steals. "Just taking a look at everything, embracing everything like that. A lot of memories were made here, and just coming into the game today, you know, (we were) just trying to come in like it's another regular game and play as hard as we can and try and to get the W. We were able to do that today."

With talking heads in Arkansas, Kentucky and even the national media hailing the game's historical significance — despite being somewhat dimmed by Arkansas' struggles in particular to this point, much of Lexington had a distinct buzz going into the contest.

Calipari of course had emotions of his own to sift through but was quick to remind his team afterwards that winning the college basketball version of the Kentucky Derby is a step in the right direction, but not to be confused with the long road still ahead in the SEC.

"It's hard to win here, and I gotta be honest with you," said Calipari after hearing some boos upon being introduced before the game. "Adou said he did the same thing. I looked up a couple of times, and I thought we were losing because I kept looking at Kentucky instead of Arkansas...And, Adou said, 'Coach, I did the same thing.' It was 15 years here."

"The great thing for me was I was able to get around and see all my dear friends. Today, I went and saw two guys that I knew weren't going be able to get out of the house. One did. So, you know, coming back and playing this well...we played well."

Inspired 3-point shooting

Arkansas' improved play can be attributed to the team's most inspired shooting performance of the season in SEC play. The Razorbacks came into the game shooting around 32 percent from three-point range on the season. In SEC play, that percentage had been noticeably lower.

Perhaps spurred on by the disrespectful reception received by their coach, who took the Wildcats to a national championship in 2012 and two other Final Four appearances, the Razorbacks shot at a 52 percent clip from long range while winning the turnover battle 14-8 and dishing out 17 assists to Kentucky's 11 in the game.

First-year Wildcat coach Mark Pope said after the game that he counted on Arkansas not being able to match Kentucky's marksmanship from the field. Under Pope, the Wildcats have garnered a reputation as an efficient offensive team that shoots well from deep — thanks to the likes of Arkansas native and former Razorback marksman Jaxon Robinson. Robinson followed Pope into Lexington after helping the former Brigham Young coach and Wildcat player get into last year's NCAA tournament.

Pope said he went to a zone defense at key junctures in the contest hoping Arkansas' shooting would cool off while masking his team's defensive liabilities.

 "(The Razorbacks) are actually, almost a full 1.5 points per possession better against zone this year than they are against man," Pope said. "And then also with the feel they had making shots, you know, that gets really complicated. If I could've run it back, I think I would've, taken a more aggressive posture probably, taking some more risk defensively."

The rise of Johnell Davis

The Razorbacks got a boost in the shooting department from senior transfer Johnell Davis who was Arkansas' other player in double figures with an 18-point, six-assist, five-rebound and two steals effort against Kentucky. Since losing their starting point guard, freshman Boogie Fland to season-ending thumb surgery two weeks ago, the Razorbacks have retooled their offense to one similar to the one Davis played in while leading Florida Atlantic to Final Four and Elite Eight runs the past two seasons.

With Wagner assuming the point guard role and running the offense through Davis, Arkansas has now won two of three in SEC play. The one loss in that stretch has been by a single score against Oklahoma at Bud Walton Arena.

"This was his best game for sure, but I think he's grown into it," Pope said. "He's he's getting a chance now to be a ball dominant guy that he's used to being. And so he's 3 games into being able to be a ball dominant guy. So I expect him to be more and more dangerous as the season goes on. As he as he fills in the space, he's a terrific player."

Building on the win

Arkansas' challenge now is to try and build momentum off of the win at Rupp by duplicating the feat at Austin, Texas on Wednesday against the Texas Longhorns. Calipari said his team needs to carry over the fearlessness they displayed in Lexington to their upcoming trip to Austin.

"Adou said it seems like we're still everybody's Super Bowl when we play," Calipari said. "We have teams making shots, bank shots, doing stuff. We're like, 'What in the world just happened?' So, yeah, I would say this was not like we pointed to this game. We didn't. We just are trying to win. Now we're going on to the next game."

"We got Sunday off. Yeah. We practice Monday, Tuesday, and travel and go to Texas. That's easy. I mean, this doesn't end. They gotta see me being confident and see me being like I told them, I'm coaching Fearless today. I want you to play Fearless. I want a DJ to run more of the stuff so they're not looking at me. They're looking at him...So there's stuff we gotta do and to build on this, but we gotta build on this. Like, alright. It's a great win. It's one. We only got two."