EJ Montgomery has career night as the Cats win #600 at Rupp

By Lukas Witt (11 years old)

Kentucky takes a satisfying win against Fairleigh Dickinson 83-52 at home and improves to 7-1 on the season. The Cats reached a milestone of 600 wins in Rupp Arena tonight getting to that mark in a single venue quicker than any other team taking their Rupp record to 600-70. Kentucky missed their first two shots before they began to take control of the game. The front court duo of EJ Montgomery and Nick Richards showed up in a big way tonight as they combined for 37 points and 19 rebounds. Montgomery finished with 25 points, 9 rebounds, one short of a double-double, and went 12 of 16 from the field, including 5 dunks. Richards lead the team in rebounds with 10 and had 12 points, and 2 blocks, securing yet another double-double, his fourth of the season. Ashton Hagans had a good outing as he led the team in assist with 11 and 11 points with 2 turnovers. The surprise breakout player of the night was Keion Brooks Jr. who finished with 15 points, 5 rebounds, and 1 blocked shot. Kentucky has a tough stretch of games coming up, having the week off will give Coach Calipari some extra practice time to get everyone healthy and recovered (note: walk-on Ben Jordan was missing from the bench tonight with a reported head injury suffered at practice this week and Dontaie Allen is suffering from knee soreness after 2 days of practice). The best part of the night was seeing the team come back out onto the floor after the game to take pictures and exchange high fives with some special needs fans with the Special Olympics. Kentucky’s next game will be on Saturday, December 14th as they take on Georgia Tech at 5 pm in Rupp Arena and can be found on ESPN.