Around the nation

Saturday night was my first chance to see Kentucky in person when the Wildcats came to Nashville and beat Vanderbilt 69-63 in an ESPN GameDay contest. What I saw confirmed a previous suspicion: it’s probably the best UK team since Rick Pitino’s 35-2 squad that won the 1996 national title — and yes, I’m not forgetting the 1998 team that won the national title, or the 2002-03 team that went 16-0 in conference play. The difference as I see it is that none of those teams quite had an Anthony Davis, whose ability to change the game in the paint almost has to be seen to be believed. Davis blocked seven more shots on Saturday, bringing his average to nearly five a game, and his length and agility give him a special ability to score and rebound at all sorts of angles. The good news for UK is that Terrence Jones looked more like last season’s Terrence Jones, and that Marquis Teague, who’s thought to be (relatively-speaking) the team’s “weak link,” was terrific with eight assists and one turnover Saturday. Along with the other two starters, Doron Lamb and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, the entire starting five could go in the first round of this year’s NBA Draft. … So, here’s the million-dollar question: is this UK team the best in the Southeastern Conference in that span? I hate to say “yes” just yet, because UK’s not won anything yet, and I’d be elevating the Wildcats over a pair of Florida teams that won national titles just a few years ago. But let me put it this way: if I’m choosing a team for a pick-up game and comparing position to position, I’m taking Davis over Joakim Noah and Lamb over Lee Humphrey, for sure. I’m probably taking Kidd-Gilchrist over Corey Brewer (Brewer was a terrific defender, but didn’t have Kidd-Gilchrist’s upside) and Jones over Al Horford (though there’s a good argument for Horford if you want to trade some of Jones’ all-around game for more traditional 4-man skills). The one place I might like UF better is at point guard; Taurean Green was a better shooter and most of the rest of the stats are negligible, but even then, that’s comparing Green as a junior with Teague as a freshman. If you could compare players at the same age, Teague, too, wins that matchup. … Speaking of the SEC, it was not a good weekend for teams in contention for NCAA bids. Florida was shocked a second time by Tennessee, which seems to be alternating between awful and terrific performances this season, and Georgia snapped Mississippi State’s 13-game home winning streak in overtime for its second road win of the year. Meanwhile, with coach Anthony Grant suspending his best three players in Tony Mitchell, JaMychal Green, and Trevor Releford, then adding reserve Andrew Steele to the list, the Crimson Tide hung close before losing at LSU on Saturday. Here’s where you’ve got to have some admiration for Grant: this is a game ‘Bama likely would have won, and a loss — UA’s eighth of the year — puts his team in serious jeopardy for an NCAA bid. … Another team I saw bits of that impressed me on Saturday was Wichita State, which pulled one of the year’s real stunners (at least in terms of margin of victory) by trouncing Creighton at its place by an 89-68 score. Playing in front of nearly 19,000 fans, the Shockers just had too much athleticism for Creighton and made getting quality looks seem too easy. There aren’t many teams hotter than Gregg Marshall’s club, which has suffered just one loss — a triple-overtime defeat at Drake — in 13 games this calendar year. … Speaking of the Missouri Valley Conference, Indiana State set a record for most 3-point shots in a game without a miss (12) in a win over Southern Illinois. …