(Credit: FanSided.com)
Moments after the Louisville loss, John Calipari says Terence Clarke is still hurt. "Clarke is hurt. He's playing at 80%. I wish I hadn't put him in today, it was mistake."
The freshman guard played for 16 minutes in the first half, and never returned after halftime. Minutes into the second half, he was seen on the stationary bike behind the bench. Calipari says it was a game time decision on if he would play, and that ultimately decided if Dontaie Allen would play. "If Terrence was a no, Dontaie Allen was playing." He goes onto say, "I told Dontaie today, 'Be ready for your chance.'" Apparently today just wasn't his time because as Clarke never played in the second half, we never got to see a Dontaie Allen appearance.
Another part of his explanation that I didn't think made sense was this quote: “There were two times I thought about putting him in, once in the first half, which, I wish I would have because I would have been able to play him in the second half. If I don’t play a guy in the first half, and it goes on, you know. But he’s gonna have a chance; it just wasn’t tonight. And I coached the game to win. That’s all I did.” Since when has it been a rule that if you don't play in the first half that you can't play in the second half? That's a new one on me.
Cal just gives these five-star starters an unlimited leash it seems, and if you're not in his core favorite of players, your generally held back and your opportunities are limited. It's not right and that's why you see guys like Quade Green, Jemarl Baker and Johnny Juzang transfer out of the program. He has got to fix this.