JUST IN: Kentucky Wildcats head coach Mark Pope have been issued a two weeks suspension after slamming the referee for false officiating that caused their loss…

Pope has some interesting postgame words on the officiating.

Let’s just say that Alabama got some home cooking on Saturday evening, and Mark Pope was having none of it.

The Kentucky Wildcats, who eventually lost by 13 to the top-five Crimson Tide, held the lead early in the game, but that was eventually dissipated. The Cats took a seven-point deficit into the break, and in the second half, things stayed the same, and Pope made sure the officials knew his opinion.

After all, there is a clip of the official just stopping the game to give Pope a quick stare and then restart action. You don’t do that unless you’re truly fed up with a coach. Pope had some arguing to do throughout the game, and he was justified as two of his starters ended with four fouls, and his top weapon, Otega Oweh, eventually fouled out, too, ending with just two points and not a single free throw.

For how Oweh plays his game, not having a free-throw attempt is all one needs to know. It seemed like he was held almost every play, and the refs didn’t seem to care too much about that. Pope did, though.

That said, here’s the clip for your viewing pleasure.

Oweh’s success has been well-documented throughout the season, having scored double figures in each game up until now. He scored just a few points and had two assists as well, so Oweh was pretty neutralized.

Here’s what Pope said about that.

This Kentucky basketball team is a ‘work in progress,’ but not all was lost at Alabama

Mark Pope was barely finished coaching Kentucky’s last game before his attention had turned to the next one.

On Wednesday night — sitting in Rupp Arena, discussing a much-needed, emphatic victory over Vanderbilt — Pope looked ahead to the Wildcats’ matchup with Alabama.

“An epic challenge of all challenges,” he said to describe the upcoming road game against the No. 4 Crimson Tide, the clear preseason choice to win the SEC, a team that was No. 1 in some national rankings back in the fall and remains one of the national title favorites.

Pope’s praise continued a couple of days later, when — on the day his Cats departed Lexington for Tuscaloosa — he used the word “challenge” another umpteen times.

“Incredibly talented” and a guard that can “impact the game in so many different ways” was how he described Mark Sears, the preseason SEC player of the year and Alabama’s do-it-all offensive threat.

This was an Alabama team that dropped 102 points on Kentucky in Rupp five weeks earlier.

This was a player coming off a 35-point performance against Missouri earlier in the week.

And this was a Kentucky team still missing Lamont Butler and Jaxson Robinson and Kerr Kriisa, a patchwork backcourt that’s still very much a work in progress as new guys are stepping up and old guys are carrying more of a burden.

This would indeed be a challenge for the Cats, who were 12.5-point underdogs before the ball was tipped. And it turned out to be a 96-83 loss for Pope’s team. And Sears dropped 30 points on Kentucky.

But it took a while for that challenge to materialize.

Alabama big man Clifford Omoruyi threw down a ferocious dunk 30 seconds into the game, and it appeared like the onslaught might be imminent.

But then Koby Brea hit a jumper. And then Travis Perry hit a 3-pointer. And then UK went off.

In no time, Kentucky led 20-9. And at that time, Sears had just two points.

Sears hit a 3 and then a layup — 20 seconds apart — but the Cats answered with another run.

Kentucky led 30-18 at one point in the first half. The Coleman Coliseum crowd — sold-out, of course — appeared dumbstruck. There was even an audible “Go Big Blue!” chant amid the sea of crimson in the early going, and they had to bump up the arena PA volume to drown it out.

For the Cats, the good times didn’t last.

“The game got a little helter-skelter,” Pope said. “We got a little fatigued. We had some protection issues. We had some defensive coverage issues that were hard.

“It was kind of the whole thing.”

The whole thing culminated in a 24-4 run. Alabama’s 12-point deficit turned into an eight-point lead, and Nate Oats’ team needed less than six minutes to do it.