NASHVILLE, Tenn. — The Kentucky Wildcats are taking a 34-game winning streak into the NCAA tournament in their quest for title.
Perfection just may be the side product.
Willie Cauley-Stein scored 15 points and grabbed 10 rebounds, and No. 1 Kentucky never trailed in beating No. 21 Arkansas 78-63 on Sunday in the SEC tournament championship game.
The Wildcats (34-0) are only the fourth team to go into the NCAA tournament undefeated since Indiana finished off the last perfect season with a title in 1976. They paired their 28th SEC tournament title with their 46th regular-season championship.
Andrew Harrison also scored 15 points for Kentucky, and his brother Aaron had 11 points.
The Razorbacks (26-8) were trying to win their second tournament title and first since 2000. Michael Qualls, coming off the bench for only the second time this season, scored 18 points, while Bobby Portis, the coaches’ pick for SEC player of the year, added 13 points.
Unlike last season when Arkansas swept Kentucky, these Wildcats proved to be just too good. With coach John Calipari rotating his players, they simply ran around the Razorbacks’ usually stifling pressure defense or passed over them.
With Nashville barely an hour’s drive from Kentucky, the Wildcats faithful filled Bridgestone Arena with blue from courtside to the rafters for a tournament record attendance of 20,315.
The Razorbacks, who have won only once in its six SEC championship game appearances, had only a couple patches of family, friends and fans inside the building.
“You people are crazy,” Calipari said after the game, seeing so much blue in the stands.
Kentucky rewarded those fans with the start they wanted, scoring the first eight points as Andrew Harrison hit two 3-pointers early. Arkansas had not trailed in this tournament, yet against Kentucky the best the Razorbacks could do was tie the game four times with the last at 19-19 on a 3-pointer by Qualls with 7:59 left.
By the time the Razorbacks worked the ball inside against Kentucky’s blue wall, they struggled to knock down shots. After Qualls’ 3-pointer, they didn’t score another field goal the rest of the half. Kentucky scored seven consecutive points as part of a 16-4 run to finish the half with a 41-25 lead.
Arkansas started the second half much better and got as close as nine points four times, the last on another jumper by Qualls, before Kentucky reeled off an 11-2 spurt. Cauley-Stein grabbed a rebound and his putback capped the run and gave Kentucky its biggest lead at 65-47.
From there, the Wildcats pushed the lead to as many as 21 points down the stretch.
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