CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Every time Kentucky tips off in the NCAA Tournament now, college basketball history is in the balance and Kentucky forward Karl-Anthony Towns is quick with an eraser. He's ready to rewrite history.
The Wildcats are the first 36-0 team in men's college basketball, and they extend that record with each victory as they march toward a possible 40-0 NCAA championship season.
"We can rewrite our own history. We've written history. We can rewrite it again. We just keep using an eraser and a pencil again,'' said Towns, a freshman forward.
A Kentucky loss at any point in this tournament also would be a game remembered in college basketball history, especially for the winning team.
What does Towns want historians to write about this team?
"I want it to say we were successful and were able to do something special and come out with a national championship. Everyone is here for that same reason, but if we want our history to be written like that, we have to make sure we start etching it in,'' Towns said.
Kentucky became the first 36-0 team last Saturday when it beat Cincinnati in the round of 32 at Louisville. UK can make more history at Quicken Loans Arena on Thursday and Saturday. If the Wildcats win both games, they tied the record for victories in a season (38), held by -- guess who? -- Kentucky.
No team has finished unbeaten since Indiana was 32-0 and won it all in 1976.
"It probably won't hit me for years from now how special this team was,'' Towns said. "When you're part of something, you get lost in the moment. That's why I think we're all lost in the moment right now. We're not thinking about was the past brought. We're thinking about what we can control right now.''
Towns is on the short list of players who could be the No. 1 pick in the 2015 NBA Draft.
"No matter where life takes us all, this will be something I won't forget in my life. I'll treasure these moments forever,'' he said.
Officially, Kentucky is the only NCAA team to win 38 games. The Wildcats were 38-2 and won the NCAA Tournament under coach John Calipari.
Calipari also coached a 38-2 team at Memphis that lost to Kansas in the championship game. However, those victories were vacated after an NCAA investigation into the recruiting of Derrick Rose. Memphis officially was 0-1 that year.
Cal on Huggs: Calipari was effusive in his praise for West Virginia coach Bob Huggins. The two will square off Thursday in a semifinal, a game that will remind many of WVU's upset of No. 1 Kentucky in the 2010 tournament.
"I've seen Bobby's teams over the years, obviously we've been friends for a long time, but he's doing stuff this year I've not seen him do and that tells you the kind of coach he is,'' Calipari said.
Calipari and Huggins were opponents when Calipari coached at Memphis and Huggins was at Cincinnati. Huggins holds an 8-2 lifetime record against Calipari.
"He and I used to be the young coaches, we were the young guys, and we turn around and now we're the old guys. I don't understand that, what happened, but that's what happened,'' Calipari said. "I've always respected what he does coaching his basketball teams, how hard they play, how physical they play, how they rebound.
"His teams, they play, they compete, they play to win, they don't have any fear. I've always respected that. But again, we went from the young coaches to now he and I are like the old guys. Like what in the world happened? And he's older than me, by the way.''
Huggins is 61 and Calipari is 56.