Five things you need to know from No. 8 Kentucky’s 87-68 win over Western Kentucky in men’s NCAA college basketball at Rupp Arena on Tuesday night: 1. Cats prove they can win “ugly.” Much has been written in the liftoff of the Mark Pope coaching era about the aesthetically pleasing brand of basketball Kentucky plays.

Here is the Herald-Leader’s preseason top-25 ranking of Kentucky high school boys basketball players for the 2024-25 season, as voted on by coaches in a statewide survey conducted by high school sports writer Jared Peck. The poll asked every coach to rank their “top 10 players in the state.”

A slow start, but Kentucky was tested in a good way by a WKU defense that showed a lot of aggressiveness and forced the Wildcats to adjust more in the second half. The Wildcats struggled shooting the entire night,