Who's Kentucky basketball's class clown?
LEXINGTON, Ky. – Soon enough, we'll see how the 2015-16 Kentucky basketball team plays, but first we need answers to the truly important questions, such as: Who's the class clown?
Freshman Skal Labissiere's giggling answer offered a hint.
"I'm not sure," he said. "I'm not in everybody's classroom."
In a very serious Courier-Journal survey of the entire squad, Labissiere and fellow five-star freshman Isaiah Briscoe were the only two players who received votes for No. 1 cut-up.
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Briscoe is "goofy," forward Derek Willis said. "He's just like one of those characters. When you're around him, you can just tell he does off-the-wall stuff."
Sophomore point guard Tyler Ulis called Briscoe "different" and said he "doesn't stop playing, 24/7. Every day, it's just like he's in a movie, a comedy."
No one would dish any specific examples of Briscoe's hijinks, although he describes himself as a prankster. He and Labissiere have that in common. The latter is apparently just a really big (6-foot-11) kid.
"I bet you weren't even thinking about Skal," junior guard Dominique Hawkins said, but "he's usually in the locker room doing something goofy – or he'll wake you up out of your sleep by just tickling your face with something. He's a clown."
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Labissiere guffawed when he learned that his secret was out.
"I always mess with them," he said. "I'm a morning person and they can be a little bit sluggish. So I'm always the one full of energy and I try to mess with them, try to get them going a little bit. Anything I can find to wake them up, I just tickle them.
"I can be pretty goofy."
He counts junior forward Marcus Lee among his victims.
"We have early-morning workouts, so you kind of come here early to get a nap before your workout," Lee said. "He'll come running in with excitement and wake you up. You wake up in a panic, and it's him. You like (that energy), but you hate it at the same time."
In all seriousness, there is some underlying significance to the silliness. Kentucky lost a staggering seven players to the NBA draft after last season. There are six new scholarship players on the roster.
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While chemistry could be an issue, "our bond is excellent right now," Hawkins said.
(NOTE: We also asked every player to name the team's leader and best dunker, and pick one Wildcat they'd want as their partner for a two-on-two game. Those results are coming shortly, but here's a spoiler: the runaway leader in two of the categories rhymes with booliss.)
Kyle Tucker can be reached at (502) 582-4361. Email him at ktucker@courier-journal.com.
