Maybe you circled Feb. 7 at defending SEC champion Florida. Perhaps you went with Feb. 10 at talented but enigmatic LSU. Or you might have chosen a Feb. 28 home game against surging Arkansas.*
Whatever game you projected as top-ranked Kentucky's biggest challenge in SEC play, one thing is for sure: It wasn't Tuesday's home game against middling Ole Miss.
A Rebels team that suffered non-conference losses to Charleston Southern, Western Kentucky and TCU defied all expectations Tuesday night, controlling the tempo, holding its own on the glass and sinking big shot after big shot. Only some big plays by Aaron Harrison and Willie Cauley-Stein and some questionable late-game decisions by Ole Miss enabled Kentucky to maintain hope of an undefeated regular season and escape with an 89-86 overtime win.
Ole Miss had a one-point lead and the ball with 30 seconds remaining in regulation when guard Jarvis Summers made the mistake of dribbling into a trap and turning it over even though his team had a timeout left. The Rebels still had a chance to win in regulation on their final possession after Andrew Harrison made only 1 of 2 free throws, but they didn't seem to have much of a plan and settled for a contested 23 footer from Summers that rimmed out.
Overtime turned in Kentucky's favor thanks to the aggressiveness of the Harrison twins and the hustle plays of Cauley-Stein. Andrew Harrison sank a go-ahead 3-pointer with 2:10 remaining, Aaron Harrison had the last of his game-high 26 points at the free throw line less than a minute later and Cauley-Stein shook off a mistake-filled finish to regulation to do all the little things Kentucky needed in overtime, contributing five rebounds and a block.*
While Ole Miss players sank to the floor in heartbreak after Martavious Newby's potential game-tying three rimmed out in the final seconds, the Rebels should take pride in what they accomplished Tuesday night even in a loss. They showed the rest of the SEC that a Kentucky team boasting nine McDonald's All-Americans is not invincible even though the Wildcats have looked that way at times this season.
Kentucky's average margin of victory in rolling to a 13-0 start had been 27.5 points per game, but Ole Miss pushed the Wildcats to the final buzzer by turning the Wildcats into a jump shooting team with its zone, by holding its own on the glass and by shooting nearly 50 percent against the nation's best defense.*
Had Ole Miss' leading scorer Stefan Moody not been forced to the sideline due to cramps late in the game, the Rebels might have won. Had streak-shooting Kentucky not sank 11 of the 20 threes it attempted, the Rebels might have won too.
Credit Kentucky for finding a way to win on a night when it wasn't at its best. The experience of being challenged for the first time this season will only help the Wildcats going forward as they'll be able to draw from it when it happens again in league play or during the postseason.

And, of course, heap praise on Ole Miss too for coming so close to doing the unthinkable as a 22-point underdog. The Rebels pushed Kentucky far more than national powers Louisville, North Carolina, Texas or Kansas did, but they fell one big shot short.
- - - - - - -
Jeff Eisenberg is the editor of The Dagger on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
Follow @JeffEisenberg