Doron Lamb celebrates after the win over Vandy Saturday. (Victoria Graff photo)

By LARRY VAUGHT

Vanderbilt gave Kentucky some problems the second half with its zone defense on a night when UK was having trouble making 3-point shots.

“The zone was troublesome I would say,” Calipari admitted. “Normallly we make more shots and it’s hard for teams to stay in a zone. But I could not get Doron to take a shot. I took him out and said, ‘If you are not going to shoot, you are not going back on the court. Your job is to shoot.’ He and Darius (Miller) have to shoot for us.”

Kentucky built a big first-half lead against Vanderbilt’s man-to-man defense.

“I wouldn’t have gone to it any sooner,” Vanderbilt coach Kevin Stallings said. “We went to it in the first half and they dunked on us. The zone was good to us in the second half.”

Lamb did confirm that Claipari had to tell him to shoot. But it was not a case of him being afraid to shoot.

“He said I had a wide-open shot and did not take it. I thought it was not open,” Lamb said. “I got back in and hit two big 3’s.”

Lamb said there have only been a “couple of times” when Calipari has had to tell him to shoot.

“He’s told me a couple of times I was not shooting enough,” Lamb said. “Now I know if I am open, always shoot it.”

No confusion: Vanderbilt’s unusual team bench arrangement that has players and coaches sitting on the end of the court rather than the sidelnes can pose problems for freshmen point guards like Marquis Teague.
“It was hard to communicate. I knew it would be,” Calipari said. “I told Marquis Teague that any time he was confused to just pick and roll, so that is what he did.”