NASHVILLE, Tenn. — For the second time in three years, the SEC Tournament's championship game will feature Arkansas against Kentucky inside a venue dubbed Rupp Arena South.
The Razorbacks (25-8) will take on the Wildcats (28-6) - which feature former Arkansas high school star Malik Monk - at noon on ESPN after both teams picked up semifinal round wins Saturday at Bridgestone Arena.
It will be a rematch of Kentucky’s 97-71 win over visiting Arkansas on Jan. 7 in a game that the Razorbacks still were in midway through the second half.
“It’s a different game, a different venue, different time,” Arkansas coach Mike Anderson said. “It’s the championship of the SEC Tournament. So we’re looking forward to the opportunity. I’m sure they are looking forward to it as well.”
Arkansas senior guard Dusty Hannahs, who had 16 points in the Razorbacks’ 76-62 win over Vanderbilt on Saturday, said his team is playing with confidence having won eight of its last nine games.
“They are a good team, but so are we,” Hannahs said. “We’re playing really good basketball right now and we’re ready to face anybody in the country. So it should be a great challenge tomorrow.
“They are so talented and have a lot of great players and you have got to bring your all. It’s big. We know we are playing for a few million people in Arkansas and there is a lot of pride wearing this jersey, there are a lot of people rooting for us and we know that and we want to deliver that for them.”
The Razorbacks have won nine games away from their home arena this season so Anderson doesn’t expect his team to be rattled playing in front of some 17,000 Kentucky fans Sunday. Anderson said it should be a great atmosphere.
"We’re looking forward to it," Anderson said. "I think our guys will come in and play. It will be played out there on that court. That’s the bottom line. We’re used to playing in front of a lot of people.”
Arkansas and Kentucky were bitter rivals in the 1990s when the teams combined to play in the national championship game every year between 1994-98. While the rivalry has cooled some in the decades since, it still is one that fires up the Razorbacks' players.
Arkansas senior guard Manny Watkins put it bluntly.
“They don’t like us and we don’t like them,” Watkins said. “So we have just got to be ready. It’s a quick turnaround and we have just got to go get some rest.
“We are not done. We are happy, but we are not done yet…It is special. We are going to bring everything that we have got.”
Kentucky has won 10 straight games after beating Alabama 79-74 in Saturday’s earlier semifinal.
De’Aron Fox had a game-high 28 points and Monk added 20 in the win.
Monk, after scoring just two points and going 1-of-7 from the field in Friday’s win over Georgia, was at Bridgestone Arena at 7:15 a.m. on Saturday with teammate Wenyen Gabriel to shoot.
“I did get up this morning and got my shoot-around in like I said I was going to do and I think that helped a lot,” Monk said. “…I think it woke me up. I got a little sweaty so I think that is what I will start doing.”
Arkansas guard Jaylen Barford, who had a team-high 18 points against Vanderbilt on Saturday, tried to downplay the Kentucky's home-court advantage in the final.
“It’s a neutral site,” Bradford said. “We’ve got a lot of confidence and we’re not too much worried about what Kentucky is doing. We are just worried about what we are doing.”