Hogs, Cats get heated in championship game

Officials keep players apart, including Arkansas's Dusty Hannahs, third from left, and Kentucky's Isaiah Briscoe (13), during a scuffle late in the second half of an NCAA college basketball game for the championship of the Southeastern Conference tournament Sunday, March 12, 2017, in Nashville, Tenn. Kentucky won 82-65. (AP Photo/Mark Humphrey)

— There’s some fight back in the Arkansas-Kentucky basketball series.

Literally.

After Kentucky put away Arkansas 82-65 on Sunday to win its third straight SEC Tournament championship and 30th overall, most of the talk was about throat slashes, trash talk, elbows and flagrant fouls.

“I said we needed to be punched in the mouth,” Kentucky coach John Calipari said. “I didn’t mean it literally.”

The game got heated in the final two minutes of the second half. Arkansas center Moses Kingsley was assessed a flagrant 2 for a hard foul on Kentucky guard De'Aron Fox.

“It was unfortunate, but at the same time, I don't think anybody was intent on trying to hurt anyone," Arkansas coach Mike Anderson said. "Our guys fought to the bitter end and just came up short.

"You saw going down the stretch two competitive teams. They’re both teams going after it, getting after it and sometimes the temperament gets out of hand."

Kingsley was ejected after the foul, in which he hit Fox in the face while attempting to block a shot. Kingsley also was assessed a technical foul in the first half when he said something to official Doug Shows after a jump ball.

Kingsley was held scoreless before halftime, and finished the game with 8 points and 6 rebounds.

“It’s something that I wish I could take back,” Kingsley said of his fouls. “I let my emotions get control of me and over-reacted and let my team down.”

Moments before Kingsley's flagrant foul, Arkansas guard Dusty Hannahs had committed a flagrant 1 - a lesser foul - when he set a hard screen against Kentucky guard Dominique Hawkins. Replays appeared to show Hannahs throw his elbows high against Hawkins.

“I was just trying to set a screen,” said Hannahs, who finished with 14 points. “I wasn’t trying to start anything. It looked worse than it was.”

Arkansas' bench appeared to become upset after Kentucky guard Malik Monk made a throat-slashing gesture toward it in the second half. Monk, a graduate of Bentonville High School about 25 minutes from the Arkansas campus, scored 17 points in his second, and likely last game against his home state team.

Monk admitted to doing a throat-slashing gesture twice during the game.

“I made a 3, emotions took over and I made like the game was over,” Monk said about a basket that was waved off as a shot clock violation after replay. “I mean, I’ve just got to learn from that.”

Calipari said he didn’t see it, but will address it with Monk.

“If I would have seen it, I would have said something,” Calipari said. “He’s a good kid. This is all new to them. Nineteen years old. He is playing against Arkansas and they are all over him.

“But there is no need for that and there’s no place for that in what we’re doing and what we are teaching at Kentucky.”

Monk also talked about a report from SEC Country that stated former Arkansas assistant coach Matt Zimmerman had trash-talked him before the game. Zimmerman is now the Razorbacks' director of operations and color analyst on the radio broadcasts.

Reportedly Zimmerman's talk was good-natured about him being in the same championship game as Arkansas, the team Monk turned down, but Monk took offense.

“I really don’t remember what happened,” Monk said. “I don’t remember what he said. He’s saying stuff before the game, we were warming up and they were talking and talking.”

Arkansas senior Manny Watkins had mentioned Saturday the dislike the two teams have for each other.

“Anytime you are playing in an Arkansas-Kentucky game, those games are heated," Watkins said. “Heated. It’s competitive. On top of that, it was a championship game. Just a lot of emotion in the game and everybody wanted to win really bad.”