People tell me Memphis is a Saturday night town. We’ll see if that holds true tonight, and the FedExForum crowd can match the energy of last Saturday morning against Georgetown.

Unfortunately for the fans, they won’t get to see freshman point guard Jerryd Bayless. Though certainly his absence due to a sprained knee will make hte game easier for the Tigers to win, it’s a shame because he’s a fun player to watch much like Derrick Rose. Without two starters — Bret Brielmaier is also injured — Arizona is really up against it tonight. The Wildcats really weren’t that deep to begin with, so losing two starters is a big blow. I’d imagine Nic Wise will have to pick up the slack for Bayless tonight. Wise plays about 25 minutes per game usually, but I’d imagine he’ll be forced to play 33+ tonight.

Meanwhile, tip-off time has been pushed back about 10 minutes due to the double overtime game between West Virginia and Oklahoma on ESPN2. It’s a Pac-10 officiating crew tonight of Mark Reischling, Michael Reed and Bill Kennedy.

Both Foxsports.com and CBS Sports.com are reporting that Arizona freshman point guard Jerryd Bayless won’t play tonight due to a sprained knee suffered in Friday’s practice.

The Wildcats will also be without starter Bret Brielmaier. That certainly changes the equation in a game that I felt all week was going to be very close and competitive. Arizona did not have much depth to begin with, and the loss of Bayless will be very difficult tonight as they try to snap Memphis’ 37-game home winning streak.

…before heading to FedExForum. Wow, these 9 p.m. starts are weird.

Anyway, it’s been a nice day watching hoops on TV. Some observations:

– I know Kentucky fans are going nuts about the loss to San Diego, and many of them want Billy Gillispie gone. That’s idiotic. Here’s the deal with Kentucky, and I’ve watched them a bunch of times now. Most of their players are really, really bad. A couple of their decent players are hurt, or just coming back from injury. And the ones who are supposed to be good? They’re absolute dogs. I’m sorry, but Joe Crawford is flat-out dogging it. In talking with a bunch of people up there, their view is that Kentucky had become a country club over the last couple years. Gillispie is trying to change the culture, and obviously he’s encountering some resistence from the likes of Crawford, Ramel Bradley, etc. What you get is what they’re putting on the court, which is a putrid product. I feel sorry for Gillispie. The reality is, any really good coach would be having problems right now. Would they have lost to San Diego, Gardner-Webb, etc? I don’t know, but it wouldn’t really matter in the big picture. In fact, it would only be masking how many holes the program has right now.

– I really was hyped to watch Tennessee-Gonzaga, and the game was kind of a letdown. Tennessee played hard, as always, and it’s a very nice win for them. As I watched the game, however, I couldn’t help but feel that Gonzaga has lost its identity. They don’t play like the scrappy mid-major anymore who does all the little things right to beat more talented teams. As their players have gotten better, they’re trying to play like everybody else plays, and at the end of the day, they just don’t have as many good players or good athletes as teams like Tennessee, Memphis, etc. Matt Bouldin and David Pendergraf play hard, but the rest of them just aren’t like the Gonzaga players of old. Austin Daye is going to be a beast, but he hasn’t figured it out yet. Jeremy Pargo is talented enough to have a big impact on a game like this, but he just didn’t play well at all. Another disappointing effort by Gonzaga, which frankly doesn’t have enough good wins to be an NCAA at-large team at this point. Meanwhile, give UT full credit for the way it played. It’s a long trip up there, as Memphis knows, and it’s not easy to beat Gonzaga in a road environment. Chris Lofton tried his best to let Gonzaga back into the game, but even he couldn’t lay enough bricks to make it happen. Lofton is still playing just yucky basketball. This has been a JaJuan Smith-Tyler Smith team to this point, and it’s been good enough. But how long can that last?