Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Can Alex Poythress improve on the perimeter for Kentucky?

Alex Poythress

Kentucky junior forward Alex Poythress is going to be one of the more important players this college basketball season.

As an elder statesman on another loaded Wildcat team with national title aspirations, the 6-foot-8 forward might hold the key to Kentucky’s fate this season. While John Calipari recruited another crop of McDonald’s All-Americans to bolster the front line and add a point guard in Tyler Ulis and a wing in Devin Booker, Booker is probably not ready to play crunch-time minutes from a mental or physical standpoint this season.

Enter Poythress, who struggled from the perimeter last season and will be asked to play more on the wing this season. According to a story from Larry Vaught of Central Kentucky News, Poythress is already working on his perimeter skills.

“I feel like I am getting more comfortable each and every day playing out there. Cal told me great job playing out there. Letting me play out there and try to prove myself,” Poythress said to Vaught.

Poythress also told Vaught that he’s been working on getting shots up this offseason. The three-point percentage for Poythress dipped from 42 percent to 24 percent last season, but he attempted the same amount of threes in both seasons and only made six more as a freshman (14-for-33 as a freshman, 8-for-33 as a sophomore).

“I feel like yeah I have (improved). I have been working on it a lot lately and with the coaches at night just trying to get better,” Poythress said to Vaught of his shooting. “A lot of us are in there a lot all the time whenever we can. We are all a bunch of gym rats really.”

After two seasons, it’ll have to be a wait-and-see approach with Poythress after his regression last season. Maybe a more confident and experienced Poythress can play more on the wing and let Kentucky have a good front court rotation with the incoming freshmen.

Either way, the Wildcats have to figure out someone to close out games on the wing and Poythress gives them the most experience, athleticism and rebounding ability if he can improve his shooting and aggressiveness. Poythress will be a player to watch for Kentucky during the team’s exhibition trip to the Bahamas beginning tomorrow.

Follow @phillipshoops