The Kentucky Wildcats Have Played at the Owensboro Sportscenter…But Not Against Kentucky Wesleyan
We're closing in on one of the best times of the year; it's like Christmas morning for me. I'm talking about the beginning of the 2021-2022 college basketball season.
KENTUCKY WILDCATS VS. KENTUCKY WESLEYAN PANTHERS--SOME HISTORY
But before we get to the official games, teams around the country will be gearing up for their upcoming campaigns by way of exhibition games. Naturally, the University of Kentucky is no exception; the Wildcats usually play TWO such tune-ups.
The first of UK's exhibition games happens Friday, October 29th at 7 PM Eastern/6 PM Central, and the opponent will be none other than our very own Kentucky Wesleyan Panthers.
It won't be the first time and I'm sure it won't be the last. In fact, games between these two opponents date back more than a century. And KWC even enjoyed a couple of victories back then--in 1911 and in 1927. The last game between the Wildcats and the Panthers that "counted" was played in 1939 with UK winning 57-18. Exhibition games don't go toward a team's record anymore.
HAS UK EVER PLAYED KWC IN OWENSBORO?
I was talking about this game with a friend of mine Sunday and he wished the game would happen in Owensboro rather than at Rupp Arena. Hey, me too. But pigs and sewing machines aren't falling out of the sky, either. And I'm not about to speculate what might happen in the event the Panthers were the home team against the Wildcats.
And then there's this...Kentucky Wesleyan actually HAS hosted UK, but that was back when KWC was located in Winchester, Kentucky. So no, there has never been a game between these two squads--both iconic in their respective divisions--at the Owensboro Sportscenter.
But that doesn't mean UK has never played a game there.
UK GAMES AT THE OWENSBORO SPORTSCENTER
From 1949 through 1954, Kentucky went 5-0 against four fellow Southeastern Conference opponents (two games against Ole Miss and one each against Mississippi State and Georgia) and Bradley University (out of the Missouri Valley Conference). I don't know why UK played here unless it had something to do with the fact that Cliff Hagan was a Wildcats superstar in that era and he was an Owensboro native. But that's just my guess.
But, to this day, UK has never played KWC on the Panthers' home floor. What a historic game that would be.
SOME ADDITIONAL KENTUCKY WESLEYAN HISTORY
Of course, there WILL be history made this Friday night as Owensboro legend Joel Utley enters his 61st season calling Kentucky Wesleyan Panther games. What an impressive career.
UK vs. Kentucky Wesleyan will be carried on both 92.5 WBKR and WOMI/1490AM--99.1FM.