It's Unanimous!!!

The Kentucky Wildcats are the number one ranked team in all of college basketball.

Take a breath.

The Kentucky Wildcats are the unanimous number one ranked team in all of college basketball.

Let it soak in.

It may not last the rest of the season, it may not last the rest of the week, but right now, the Cats are on top of the college basketball world. And it's been a very long time, just over six years, as a matter of fact, since UK fans could celebrate being in this position.

What a wild ride it has been up to this point: the firing of drunkard/demolition man Billy Gillispie followed swiftly by the hiring of savior John Calipari, the amassing of the most highly touted freshman class in the history of college basketball and the return of Patrick Patterson, all leading up to a 19-0 start culminating in a no. 1 ranking.

The bad news is that an undefeated record and a number one ranking at this point do not ensure a national title, a final four, or even an SEC tournament championship. However, the good news is that this is not college football, and one loss (even two, three, or four losses) does not prevent any of the previously mentioned accolades.

The Wildcat team that took the floor on Saturday against Arkansas would have beaten all but five teams in this country by double digits. Easily. Oh, and they wouldn't have lost to those five other teams, they most likely would have beaten them by nine. The Cats were lighting it up from behind the arc (thanks to Darius Miller's overdue breakout game) while suffocating the Razorbacks on the defensive end. John Wall finally looked healthy again, and Daniel Orton was the physical presence we need off the bench for the rest of the season.

Everyone did what they were supposed to do and John Pelphrey's squad never stood a chance.

South Carolina awaits on Tuesday, and the expectations should be pretty high after Saturday's dismantling of Arkansas. The Gamecocks best post player, Dominique Archie, is out for the year, and the Cats have a massive, and I mean massive, advantage in the paint. Yes, Devan Downey is a stud, and yes, he has absolutely tormented the UK back court for the past two years. Five words will put an end to that: John Wall and Eric Bledsoe. No more Michael Porter trying to stick with the fastest (next to our backcourt) guard in the SEC.

Confidence is running high right now, and even though the skeptics will boldly declare that Kentucky is set up for a letdown, I think Calipari has these guys primed to play the second half of the season as good or better than they did on Saturday.

Cats by 18.