LEXINGTON, Ky. -- For a little more than an hour of real time Friday night at Rupp Arena, the Miles men's basketball team had caught the nation's attention.

In front of a national television audience, the Division II Golden Bears had pushed the No. 10 team in Division I, Kentucky, into a space no one thought they'd be in during the exhibition contest. The Wildcats, who trailed by as many as 10 points, were behind at halftime and thoughts of an upset began to waif through the college basketball universe.

While Kentucky would ultimately come back and take an 80-71 decision, Miles had put everyone on notice that not bringing your best effort to the floor against the Golden Bears can put you in a position to get beat, no matter your standing in the game.

"I thought we competed well. We knew who we were playing, that this was Kentucky and John Calipari, so we knew what we were up against," said Miles head coach Fred Watson. "We didn't think we were going to win the game on the scoreboard, but we wanted to win the game within ourselves. We wanted our fan base to be proud of the effort we put forth, and I think we did that tonight."

The effort in the first half was well beyond what Kentucky expected. Miles came out on fire from the field, especially beyond the 3-point arc. With the score tied at two, Miles got two 3-pointers from Elijah Horton and another from Yasim Hooker (11 points, five rebounds, three assists, two steals) as part of an 11-2 run give the Golden Bears an early cushion. When the Wildcats had cut the deficit to 17-16, Roger Davis drained threes on back-to-back possessions to extend the lead.

The long-range jumpers would continue to fall throughout the half. Horton (nine points) and Mykayle Carter (six points) sandwiched 3-balls around an offensive putback by Anthony Fairley (four points, five rebounds, one block) to give the Golden Bears their biggest lead, 36-26, with 5:28 left before the break. After Kentucky cut the deficit to a single point with two minutes left in the half, Miles got 3-pointers from Davis and Truitt Spencer (six points) to go into the half with a 46-39 lead. In all, Miles shot 59 percent from the field and was a staggering 11-of-15 (73 percent) on 3-pointers over the first 20 minutes.

"It definitely surprised us to some degree, just period, no matter who you're playing," said Kentucky guard Kellen Grady. "Eleven threes in one half of college basketball is a lot of threes. It's impressive."

But the start of the second half was a different story. Kentucky scored the first eight points after the break to take the lead. Brandon Miller would get a bucket on an offensive rebound to put Miles back on top, 48-47, but it would be the Golden Bears final lead of the contest. Miles would go nearly six minutes before it scored again and the Wildcats would score 14 consecutive points to take control.

"(From) the second half on, they did a really good job of pushing us out of our offense, so we got a little bit out of rhythm there. Subsequently, we didn't make the shots we made earlier," Watson said. "Defense kept us in it until we could make one or two here and there to keep us in the game, but they just picked up the pressure on us. They just pushed us out a little further from where we wanted to start our offense, and then we just got out of rhythm."

Kentucky would continue to pour it on, pushing its advantage as high as 16 points late in the second half. But Miles kept fighting. Davis and Miller (two of them) would knock down 3-pointers on consecutive possessions to bring Miles within seven points with 30 seconds remaining.

"I think first half, we already had the energy. We knew we just were ready to come out and play and knew Kentucky, that's just a big challenge, a big stage, for us to just come out and hit shots like that with some rhythm to them. Just playing well," said Davis, who had a team-high 14 points. "Second half when we came, we still had it. I felt like it was just a little bit more pressure and we were missing shots, and they just had the up tempo."

Despite the final score, the Golden Bears felt like they put on an admirable performance.

"This isn't only for Miles. This is for all HBCU's. You don't really see HBCU's come in here and stick with Kentucky. That's crazy," said Miller, who finished with 11 points, eight assists and five rebounds."A dream came true for every single one of us. We just hope that we made everybody outside of Miles, outside of the HBCU community, we just hope we made you guys proud."

Joel Logan had eight points while adding seven rebounds and two blocked shots (both team highs) and Patrick Rucker has two points, one rebound and one assist to round out the scoring for Miles, which opens its regular season Saturday against Oakwood in Atlanta.