Clara Strack Blocks Six as No. 14 Kentucky Opens With 85-42 Rout of Morehead State

LEXINGTON, Ky. Kentucky missed its first three shots of the season on Monday night, Nov. 2. Then the Wildcats scored the next 13 points, and the rest of the evening at Historic Memorial Coliseum was a formality. No. 14 Kentucky opened its season with an 85-42 win over Morehead State, led by as many as 43 points and was up by exactly that much at the final buzzer.

Senior center Clara Strack led the way with 17 points, nine rebounds, six blocks and three assists in only 22 minutes. First-year guard Ajša Sivka added 12 points and eight assists in her Kentucky debut, senior guard Diana Collins scored 12 on perfect 5 of 5 shooting, freshman Maddyn Greenway also scored 12, junior forward Me'Arah O'Neal had 10 points and seven rebounds, and freshman Emily McDonald scored 10. Freshman forward Savvy Swords grabbed a game-high 11 rebounds, nine of them on the offensive glass. Kentucky moved to 1-0 and Morehead State fell to 0-1 in front of 4,099 fans.

Here is the official box score (opens in a new tab), Kentucky's recap (opens in a new tab) and Kentucky's postgame notes (opens in a new tab).

A 13-0 start after a shaky first minute

Kentucky won the opening tip and promptly came up empty on its first three looks. Strack fixed that herself with a putback for the first points of the season. Sivka followed with a 3, Swords came off the bench as the first substitute and hit a baseline jumper to make it 7-0, Sivka scored in the lane, and Asia Boone added a basket for an 11-0 lead at the first media timeout. Swords scored again to push it to 13-0 before the Eagles got on the board.

Strack converted a three-point play to make it 16-2, and Kentucky led 18-4 after one quarter.

The second quarter went much the same way. O'Neal and Collins scored, Sivka hit her second 3, and a 27-6 lead became 33-9. McDonald scored her first points as a Wildcat to make it 35-11, and Kentucky went to the locker room up 42-15, with Strack's 13 points leading the way.

The third quarter opened with Collins scoring on back-to-back layups for a 48-17 lead. Transfer forward Ayanna Patterson scored her first points in a Kentucky uniform to make it 56-20, McDonald finished an and-one to push the lead to 37, and Kentucky led 63-28 after three. In the fourth, an O'Neal baseline jumper and a Collins 3 stretched it to 70-31, and the margin eventually reached 43.

Strack's 22 minutes

The headline line belonged to the senior center. Strack finished 8 of 18 from the floor with 17 points, nine rebounds, six blocks, three assists and a steal. Her six blocks tied for the third-most in a single game in program history, according to Kentucky's notes, on a list she already sits atop. The notes also say she is only the second Division I women's player since 2002-03 to post at least 17 points, nine rebounds, six blocks, three assists and a steal in 22 minutes or fewer. The other was Breanna Stewart, against Houston on Jan. 7, 2014.

Strack said the opener was about getting settled, and that it "just felt good to get back, knock the rust off, shake the nerves out, and be back in front of the fans."

The blocks were part of a broader defensive night. Kentucky blocked 11 shots as a team, forced 20 Morehead State turnovers and scored 21 points off them. The Eagles scored two points off Kentucky's eight giveaways. Kentucky also owned the paint, 54-20, and the glass, 49-30. The 42 points were the fewest Kentucky has allowed in a season opener since Alabama State scored 35 on Nov. 7, 2018.

Sivka runs the show in her debut

Sivka was the newcomer who looked most at home. She played a team-high 27 minutes, made 3 of 6 shots, both of her 3-point tries and all four of her free throws, and handed out eight assists against two turnovers. She also had three rebounds, a block and a steal.

Her own description of her game was short. "I'm always going to look for teammates," Sivka said.

Strack was more expansive about her new backcourt partner. "I love playing with Ajsa. Obviously, she's an incredible player. I mean, she's already been drafted," Strack said. She also pointed to the size of this group: "We're very tall, we're very long."

Freshmen get on the board, and the shooting gets a pass

All three freshmen scored their first career points. Greenway was the most efficient, scoring 12 on 4 of 8 shooting and 4 of 4 at the line with four assists in 22 minutes. McDonald scored 10 in 18 minutes and hit one of Kentucky's five 3s. Swords scored six and spent most of her 23 minutes crashing the offensive glass, where her nine offensive rebounds were more than Morehead State's entire team managed (seven).

Kenny Brooks liked the energy from that group. "They had spunk. They're very hard workers; they want to get better," he said of the freshmen.

The perimeter shooting was the one sour note. Kentucky went 5 of 23 from 3. Sivka and Collins were a combined 4 of 4, McDonald was 1 of 4, and the rest of the roster went 0 for 15, including Boone at 0 for 5, O'Neal and Strack at 0 for 4 apiece and Greenway at 0 for 2. Boone finished with two points on 1 of 7 shooting in 24 minutes. Kentucky still shot 45 percent overall because it lived at the rim.

Brooks made clear the opener was a first step. "I thought our defense was good in the first quarter, first part of the game, but we have a lot to work on. But it's a good start," he said. He also noted that Morehead State's new coach and roster left his staff with no film.

Rotation notes and Morehead State

Brooks started Collins, Boone, Sivka, O'Neal and Strack, and Swords was the first player off the bench. All 11 available Wildcats played, with only Dominika Paurova not seeing the floor, and nobody logged more than Sivka's 27 minutes. Six players reached double figures, the first time Kentucky has done that since a game at Vanderbilt on Feb. 22, 2026. Patterson added four points and four rebounds in 14 minutes.

"We spread the minutes out, and we're going to be in a working process for a little while," Brooks said.

For Morehead State, Kensley Feltner was the lone bright spot, scoring 16 points on 6 of 11 shooting, including 3 of 6 from deep, in 29 minutes. Lanae Riley added 11 points and five rebounds, and Alonna Poole scored eight off the bench on 4 of 8 shooting. Heidi Smith played 36 minutes and grabbed a team-high seven rebounds but went 0 for 8 from the floor. The Eagles shot 30.9 percent overall, went 4 of 9 at the free throw line and had seven assists against 20 turnovers.

What it means for Kentucky

This was the kind of opener Kentucky expects. The Wildcats are now 45-8 all time in season openers, with 18 straight wins, and 49-4 in home openers, also with 18 in a row. The program leads the series with Morehead State 35-4. Under Brooks, Kentucky is 13-0 when holding an opponent to 50 points or fewer and 24-1 when it scores 80 or more. Brooks improved to 49-19 at Kentucky and 566-223 in his 25th season as a head coach.

"It's really good to get that under our belt," Brooks said. "But I was proud of the kids, the way they handled some of the action."

The early evidence points to a team built on length and defense. The open question is perimeter shooting beyond Sivka and Collins. Boone and O'Neal combined to go 0 for 9 from 3, and that will matter far more once the schedule turns.

It turns quickly. Kentucky hosts Northern Kentucky on Thursday, Nov. 5, at 6:30 p.m. ET on SEC Network Plus, then faces No. 25 NC State in Charlotte on Sunday, Nov. 8, at 3 p.m. ET on ESPN2. Home games against Evansville on Nov. 11, Eastern Michigan on Nov. 15 and Marshall on Nov. 20 follow, before a Thanksgiving weekend trip to Daytona Beach for games against Maine and South Dakota State. Kentucky then hosts Clemson on Dec. 3 and Louisville on Dec. 9, both at Rupp Arena.

Sources: ESPN box score, UK Athletics (recap, postgame notes and postgame quotes).

Photo: Sydney Yonker/UK Athletics.