Michael Gilchrist

For the second straight year, a Kentucky recruit had a dominant inside performance at the Nike Hoop Summit. This time it was Chicago’s Anthony Davis, who was playing in his first international competition, who helped the USA Basketball all-stars beat a world team 92-80 Saturday night in Portland. Davis had a double-double with 16 points and 10 rebounds. His 10 rebounds tied the U.S. Nike Hoop Summit record for rebounds set by Tyler Hansbrough in 2005, Jeremaine O’Neal in 1996 and Kevin Garnett in 1995.

Anthony Davis of Kentucky was named the Southeastern Conference's player of the year Monday as well as the league's top freshman and best defensive player in voting by the league's coaches. Kentucky's John Calipari, who led No. 1 the Wildcats to a 16-0 conference record, was honored as the SEC Coach of the Year and senior Darius Miller won the Sixth Man of the Year award. Davis owns the school and conference records for most blocks in a season with 146. He averages  a team-high 14.4 points and 9.8 rebounds per game.

KNOXVILLE - Kentucky is winning. Sometimes, that's all that matters. In between the good and the bad, the second-ranked Wildcats have enough talent to overcome glaring weaknesses and adversity. Kentucky won two of its first three league games on the road this week and has racked up nine straight victories since losing at Indiana more than a month ago. Kentucky has freshmen Anthony Davis and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist on its side to make up for up and down outings by veteran performers Terrence Jones, Doron Lamb and Darius Miller.

LEXINGTON - Because of Kentucky coach John Calipari's success promoting basketball in China and helping coaches there, the Dominican Republic national team has expressed an interest in having him as a coach. On Tuesday, Calipari posted on his website — Coachcal.com — a statement indicating that he might be close to accepting the job. Here’s part of his statement: “Not only would I help train coaches in the Dominican Republic and here in Lexington like we have with the Chinese coaches, but I would also coach their national team.

Draftexpress.com analyst Matt Kamalsky was just as surprised as many University of Kentucky basketball fans when freshman Terrence Jones decided Saturday to take his name out of the NBA draft. “Jones returning surprised me since he was still going to be a high first-round pick despite his late season struggles,” said Kamalsky. “With all the players ahead of him (in the draft) that stated that they wouldn't enter the draft, I thought Jones holding out would make him more likely to declare and hire an agent.” So did most Kentucky fans, especially after Brandon Knight confirmed a day earlier that he would keep his name in the draft.

Going into the next college basketball season, it’s not hard to figure that Kentucky, North Carolina or Ohio State will be the three top-ranked teams — or should be based on returning talent and reinforcements the teams have added. But from a pure NBA talent standpoint, will UK, North Carolina or Ohio State have more talent going into next season? That’s the question I¿posed to Draftexpress.com analyst Matt Kamalsky, who evaluates talent on a daily basis with no bias toward any team.

ESPNU national recruiting director Paul Biancardi has coached against John Calipari and predicted as soon as Calipari was hired at Kentucky that he would not need long to restore the Wildcats as a national championship contender. With the recent commitment of Oregon’s Kyle Wiltjer to Kentucky, Calipari has all but secured a third straight No. 1 recruiting class, and Biancardi offers these insights on Calipari and the Kentucky program: Question: Has Calipari’s recruiting success surprised even you?

LEXINGTON - Florida wants to take 3-point shots and got off 27 against Kentucky on Tuesday. However, Florida didn't do what it normally does - and that's make a lot of those shots. The Gators came into the game leading the nation with 10.3 made 3-pointers per game, but hit just six in a 78-58 loss to No. 1 Kentucky that gives the Wildcats a two-game lead in the Southeastern Conference race. The Gators made just two of their first 17 3s when Kentucky built a sizeable lead before connecting on four of their final 10 tries.

Evan Daniels, a national recruiting analyst for http://www.scout.com , spent most of the summer watching the nation’s top high school players play and recently helped http://www.scout.com release its revamped player rankings that dropped University of Kentucky commit Michael Gilchrist of Philadelphia from No. 1 overall to fifth nationally. Daniels offers his insights on Gilchrist and other UK-related recruiting topics: Question: Should Kentucky fans be worried that Gilchrist dropped in the http://www.

Kyle Wiltjer says he has always “gone a different route” than many thought he should, so giving a verbal commitment to play basketball at Kentucky without taking an official visit to UK was not that hard for him to do. “I wanted to make sure I was not rushing into anything, but from day one I said when I found the right fit and the time was right, I would make a decision,” the 6-9 Portland, Ore., player said. “I felt it was a good fit at Kentucky.” Wiltjer averaged 16.5 points per game last year and helped Jesuit High School win a second straight Class AAAAAA title.