Mark Pope talks Kentucky's missed opportunities in loss against Florida

The Kentucky Wildcats found themselves surprisingly within striking distance in the final minute against Florida on Saturday. After going down as much as 16 in the second half, the Wildcats climbed back. Even when Florida answered them, they still never stopped fighting. That impressive determination had them within five with just 30 seconds left, but were just unable to pull through.

That's when the mistakes came back to haunt them. All of those turnovers and missed layups that Kentucky had thoughout the game turned out to the biggest factor in the tough loss. Mark Pope talked about what went wrong for Kentucky. He started out by noting the offensive rebounding efforts. The Wildcats out-rebounded the best team at crashing the glass during the first half, creating a tied effort there. But then, the Gators upped their effort in the second half, ending with a 25-17 advantage.

"I felt like we got the stops we need down the stretch, we couldn't grab rebound, which is exactly what they do. It's what they do," Pope said on Kentucky's rebounding effort vs. Florida. "We'll get better at that. We'll get better at carving out space. We'll get better at getting the second hit. ...We had some things that go great for us early on, and then, and then, you know, we kind of got beat up on the glass in the second half. We had managed in the first half, we got beat up a little bit."

But it was actually Florida's shooting that made the biggest difference for them on the offensive end. Kentucky let a team that has shot 29 percent during SEC play essentially go nuclear against them, with two guards, Xavian Lee and Urban Klavzar, combining for nine threes, as Klavzar had four of his five in the second half.

"I thought the difference in the game, probably for them today, was their guard play was, was, was better," Pope said on Florida against Kentucky. " I thought that gave him a real boost, especially earlier, the emotions coming into this game, the build up and just what you see." Pope went on to say that he likely made mistakes with the matchups on Florida's guards. "I probably made a mistake on matchups. I probably should have re-thought that a little bit."

Kentucky guard Jasper Johnson (2) gets pressure from Florida guard Urban Klavzar (7) during the second half. — Kentucky guard Jasper Johnson (2) gets pressure from Florida guard Urban Klavzar (7) during the second half of a NCAA mens basketball game at Steven C. O'Connell Center Exactek arena in Gainesville, FL on Saturday, February 14, 2026. [Alan Youngblood/Gainesville Sun] | Alan Youngblood/Gainesville Sun / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

Then comes Kentucky's costly turnovers, which Florida ended up with 25 points off of. Combine that with a mind-boggling 15 missed layups, it was a game where they just could not capitalize. Here is what Pope had to say.

"Usually that feeds right into our wheelhouse. We were a little sped up. I actually didn't dislike the looks that our guys earned for the most part. Early on, we had some shots we really liked. It just kind of back-rimmed out. I guess that got us a little distracted early on and then I thought we got a little bit rushed. I thought there was a stretch of three or four minutes in where we got a little rushed. And then I thought in the second half, mid-half, we got a little frantic. This was one of those games where you wish you had five time outs just to settle us. The guys were able to finally recover, we just couldn't get over the hump."

"We were disappointingly poor at the rim and that's what Florida does," Pope continued. "So it's a credit to them and it's something that we have to get better at. I thought we got good opportunities to the rim and we just didn't finish. Part of it was being sped up. Part of was their length. Part of it was anticipating things. Part of it was trying to lean away from contact. Part of it is not being disciplined enough to play off two feet and take the next option that's available to us. And that's what they do. Also, they get you sped up. They get you looking around."

Costly mistakes costed Kentucky, on both ends of the ball, resulting in them coming up short against an elite Florida team on the road. There is nothing that this team should hang their head about, mainly because they fought and nearly overcame all of the mistakes in the game.