March 19, 2025 • 14 mins
Welcome to episode twelve of Behind Kentucky Basketball presented by UK Federal Credit Union! Jimmy Dykes sits down with Michelle Knezovic to discuss the dominance of the SEC this year and what stands out with Kentucky. Tune in as we dive into these topics and more on this episode of Behind Kentucky Basketball.
Presented by: UK Federal Credit Union
Presented by: UK Federal Credit Union
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
We had a Mario on this podcast earlier this season
and he's he's from England. Then he played soccer growing up,
and he told me that a lot of his coaches,
you know, connect his passing ability in court vision to
him playing soccer growing up and being able to see
the pitch and now see the court. Yeah. And I
feel like when I saw him do that at Tennessee,
like came full circle. I'm like, wow, Wow, he can
(00:20):
really see and run a little bit at the point guard.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Yeah, he's a unique player. He's a hard matchup and
if if you are married to a system like Mark
Pope is, and I like that word married, like you
believe in at one hundred percent. He had to identify
the perfect guy in the portal and he did. You know,
there's some guesswork still involved in that portal when you
have to rapidly react to a guy that went in
(00:47):
and Mark saw something that that that that he wanted
and needed desperately, and Amar has filled those shoes well
for him.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Welcome into another episode of Behind Kentucky Basketball. This week,
I'm joined with ESPN analyst Jimmy Dikes. Jimmy, thanks so
much for stopping by our studios man, great studio, right,
I mean this is like ESPN top quality level what.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
You guys got here. So thank thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Of course, I think I need to clip that and
like put that that might be a quote outside of
this door commercial. I was just talking to you, I said,
is this your fifth Kentucky game you've been on this season?
You're here for the Kentucky Arkansas game, fifth or sixth,
But you've got a chance to watch the cats up class.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I have. Yeah, I've seen them. I've seen them at
times at the very best. Like I think back to
the gun Zaga game. At gunzag you know, they kind
of turned the corner in the second half and Jackson
Robinson had to take control of the point guard. And
been here for a couple of SEC Conference games. I've
had him on the road, had him at Vanderbilt didn't
go their way, and had him at Tennessee and it
did go their way. So I'm a big believer in Kentucky.
(01:57):
You know, offensively, there as good as anybody in the
colle game right now, and they're getting better defensively. The
numbers show with the film shows it, So I think
there's a lot of good stuff in front of this team.
Still get ready to get head into March here not
too far future.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
It's going to be yeah, before we know it, which
is crazy. You mentioned the recent game that you're on
in Knoxville, Kentucky Tennessee. Tennessee one of the best defenses
in the country. Rick Barnes always has them ready. Defensively,
Kentucky one of the best offenses in the country. Without
Lamont Butler, Andrew Carr was extremely limited. I think he
only played under two minutes or something in that game.
What maybe surprised you the most? You mentioned Jackson Robinson
(02:33):
had played a little point guard in Gonzaga. He had
to take over that point guard role again in Knoxville.
What did you like from the team and how do
you think they rose to the occasion without thanking you guys.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Yeah, well without a point guard, I mean you would
think is Kentucky going to be able to just get
into their offense? First of all, because Tennessee's the number
one defensive team in the country. They handled that. They
always got into their actions. Jack Jackson Robinson got it
into him. Some Amari Williams got him into their offense.
Some They had a low turn over game, you know,
without Lamont Butler, which was important, and I thought, I know,
(03:04):
Tennessee settled for some jump shots. They took forty five threes,
which is crazy for Tennessee to take that many threes.
I don't care who they're playing, but Kentucky had a
lot to do with it. I mean, they were they
were good guarding the ball, Michelle, they were good in
the gaps. I mean, they guarded Tennessee exactly like you
have to guard him. And Tennessee kind of also took
the bait. So I think is one of Mark's better
defensive games, especially on the road and conference play. And
(03:29):
then you know, they shot the ball well against Tennessee's defense,
which is not easy to do, and they got they
got some really good open looks, so, you know, and
they were coming in losers of I think back to
back games Alabama and Yeah, and you're looking at going
to Tennessee and then coming home to Arkansas, the emotions
of the game that that's going to entail. It felt
like kind of a must win for both of them, honestly,
(03:50):
and Kentucky got a great one. They did.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Yeah, you know, you talk about Vanderbilt, who had given
a loss to Tennessee and Kentucky heading into that game.
Other team that has has snuck into the top twenty five,
and you being able to cover a lot of these
SEC teams. I mentioned you've been on a lot of
Kentucky games, but really you've covered the entire league for
a very long time.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
Now.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
When you looked at this league at the beginning of
the year and now we're a little bit halfway there,
I mean, what have you seen from it? And how
incredible has this league been?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah? I thought before the season ever started the league
had a chance to get ten bids and that would
set a record for the SEC. I've ben about a
month into it. I thought that number could be higher.
I actually got called by one of my bosses, the
ESPN said, and you might want to back off that
a little bit aside. I believe it like I believe it.
And here we are now heading into February and all
(04:43):
the predictions are somewhere between eleven and thirteen teams. So Michelle,
it's the best the league's ever been. I mean, even
the three or four teams are going to finish in
the bottom of the SEC this year. They have future pros,
every one of them. Has one, you know, and great coaches,
and you know, the bases are totally into it now,
the student sections everywhere you go, Like basketball has just
(05:05):
risen up in a powerful league like the SEC. They
have fought their way through the football and all the
other things that can sometimes kind of push you to
the back. So it's going to be a record number
of teams from this league. I think there'll be a
record number of teams ever to come out of one
league for that NCAA tournament, a minimum of eleven. It
could be thirteen, which is a crazy number.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
I mean, that would be incredible. What do you think
the SEC Tournament will be like?
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Well, it's always a great event. I don't buy into
the narrative that winning the SEC Tournament is going to
be more difficult than winning the NCAA Tournament. The nca
Tournament is a beast. It is an absolute beast. You're
on neutral floors, traveling thousands of miles sometimes away from
your home campus, playing teams you've never seen all year.
(05:51):
That's the most difficult thing to win in college basketball.
The SEC Tournament this year will be the second most
difficult thing to win most likely, probably maybe even the
third most difficult because I think winning the regular season
over a two month grind, all the things you got
to go through to be the SEC regular season champ,
I think is probably more difficult than winning the tournament.
(06:14):
With that being said, the tournament's going to be spectacular.
I mean, even the opening games on Wednesday night, you're
going to have a team or two that still has
hope of a couple more wins we could get in
the NCAA tournament. Then certainly when you get into Thursday,
in the quarterfinals on Friday, it's going to be a
ranked team versus a ranked team.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Well, and even thinking about it, on a Wednesday, you
could have a ranked team playing on that first day
of the SEC tournament. You know, I know we looked
at the league as a whole, but kind of circling
back into Kentucky, there was something that you mentioned that
you saw against Tennessee, and it was a Mary Williams
doing some of the ball handling and bringing the ball
up and really facilitating that offense. How unique is that
(06:52):
for you to see a seven foot or be able
to handle the ball that way and run an offense.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
Yeah, there, I don't see too many other teams in
college ball that has that built into their system. They
recruit that system. They got a guy that can play
it out with Amaro Williams. I mean against Tennessee, I
remember one possession he brought the ball the entire link
to the floor and we then drove it and scored
with a no past possession. So he's a big key
for this offense. I mean, you've got to have a
guy up top that can run what Kentucky calls zoom
(07:18):
action and all the things they do on the side
of the floor. So dominant rebounder, very good defender, Like
he keeps Kentucky from getting punked inside. And that's a
big deal in this league because if you don't have
someone with some size and some physical presence about you
that can drag other bigs away, it can happen to you.
(07:40):
And he's just as valuable as anybody on this Kentucky lineup.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
All right, listen, everybody, we need to take a brief
moment to thank our podcast sponsor UK Federal Credit Union,
as the official credit union of the University of Kentucky.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
UKFCU understands that students need support and that's why they've
created the Student Rewards Account which offers them five percent
cash back on all debit card purchases to students aged
thirteenth twenty five. Visit UKFCU dot org or stop by
one of their seven local branches to open an account.
Today bederally insured by NCUA.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
We had a Mari on this podcast earlier this season
and he's he's from England and he played soccer growing up.
And he told me that a lot of his coaches,
you know, connect his passing ability in court vision tim
playing soccer growing up and being able to see the
pitch and now see the court. Yeah, and I feel
like when I saw him do that at Tennessee, like
came full circle. I'm like, wow, Wow, he can really
(08:36):
see and run a little bit at the point guard position.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
Yeah, he's a unique player. He's a hard matchup and
if if you are married to a system like Mark
Pope is, and I like that word married, like you
believe in at one hundred percent. He had to identify
the perfect guy in the portal and he did. You know,
there's some guesswork still involved in that portal when you
have to wrap it react to a guy that went
(09:01):
in and Mark saw something that he wanted and needed desperately,
and Amari has filled those shoes well for him.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
So a coach Pope takes over this Kentucky program in
the spring has to put together this roster you mentioned,
look at the portal, identify players that he thinks can
all fit together. Maybe not the five best players or
the top of the portal, but the five players that
can all match and fit together. I remember that you
came to Kentucky in the off season and you were
(09:30):
torn or you were going to see different colleges to
get ready for the season to start. Walk me through
maybe what you remember from first coming here when Mark
Pope took over the program, and share anything you guys
talked about and your first impression.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
I guess yeah, I think it was. I think it
was around Pro Day. I don't know it was back
in it was early. It may have even been to September.
I just came into watching practice for a day, but
I left thinking that they're going to be good like
I saw. Okay, they got bigs. They got two guys
on the wings and Break Robinson. They can shoot as
well as anybody in college ball. They got a stud
(10:03):
at the point guard spot, and Butler Otega Olway is
a physical guy, driving like there's depth there, there's They're
coached hard. They play unique offensive system, which is different
than anyone else in this league other than I mean
Alabama's a little similar. I thought from day one they
were gonna have a very successful year. And you know,
I keep hearing people was picking them, Ah, they're going
(10:24):
to finish somewhere in the middle, and they might. They
still might with how the league came yeah, yeah, but
they could also win the National championship. Finishing five hundred
in the SEC this year, That's that's how good the
league is. Because twenty eleven, I believe, is when the
Big East put eleven teams in Yeah, uh, and Yukon
finished five hundred in league play that year and went
and won the National Championship. That you could have a
(10:47):
team somewhere in that five hundred, maybe a game above
or below at least get to the final four out
of the league this year.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
It's it's exciting, it's fun. But I think you know,
when you talk about the games, one thing that coach
Hope always says is the next game is the biggest game.
Because in the SEC, I mean, you can go to
a Vanderbilt, who is a team who wasn't ranked at
the time, But the next game is the biggest game
when you look at this game that you're about to
hop on the call. Obviously coach cal Perry is coming
(11:15):
back for the first time. This has happened before when
coach Patino was at Louisville he came back when Tubby
was the coach. Here anticipation around this game, I mean,
probably one of the biggest college basketball games in a
very long time. With coach cal coming back the next
season and Kentucky not going and playing at Arkansas this year.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Sure, it has to be one of the most confusing
times in the history of Big Blue Nation, because I
think there's still I mean, we're let all over twenty
four hours away from tip. I still think there's a
lot of people trying to figure out what do I do. Like,
I appreciate everything that coach cal did, the national championship,
the runner ups, all the great memories we had with
(11:55):
the fifty four straight wins in up when he first
got started, so many great memories, Like I want to
respect that and applaud that. But he's walking in with
a most likely erazorback red something on. He's now the
opposing coach of a team that we've had a little
bit of a rivalry with over the years. When you
go back to Nolan Richardson and how heated it was.
(12:16):
So I think there's some confusion on what do I do? Sure,
and it's gonna be an interesting, interesting time when he
walks in and gets introduced. But I do know this,
once the game starts, all that's all. That stuff doesn't matter.
It does not matter. Man, Kentucky better be playing at
their best. Arkansas better be playing at their best.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
When you hop on a call for a game that
has a lot of anticipation, or I mean a historic game,
do how much do you think about that? Do you
ever get nervous when you when you hop on the call.
I know you've been doing this for so long, but.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
The yeah, I don't know if nervous is the right word.
You know, you're always on edge a little bit. It
doesn't matter if I'm doing two teams that aren't even
ranked in the games on esp and U still you
get that right before you get on the air and
my prepare Do I have energy? You know all the
things that I go through, protection over my words, all
the things that I think about, pray about. It won't
(13:07):
be any different for this game. But you have to
put some thought into what what's my opinion on the night,
you know what, what? How do I want a word?
What I what I think about coach call and what
he did here and what Coach Pope's doing now and
and all those things. So, uh, there's yeah, there's some
extra preparation that goes into a big event game like this.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Absolutely, you played basketball at Arkansas under coach Suton and
then coached here at Kentucky under him. What do you
remember about your time here on the coaching staff?
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Two of my fondest memories of my lifetime were the
two years that I were here. I mean, it's a
it's a special place. I was just talking with Coach
Pope about it. Like unless you've been inside that locker
room where Kentucky you know basketball has all all the
work goes goes down and just to feel for it
around here, you can't explain it to anyone, know, you
(14:00):
really can't. So I love my time here. I still
love the Bluegrass State. I love I love the horse Race,
I love Keenland, I love the basketball, I love the
passion that the fan base has. It's one of my
favorite places to come to do a game because you
know the product's always going to be good, it's always
going to be a big game. I can walk to
the I can walk to the arena, which is a
big deal when you're doing sixty games a year like
(14:21):
I am. So Lexington, Kentucky has and always have will
have a special place in my heart.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
Absolutely well, Jimmy, we love having you here. Thank good
luck on the call on the game tomorrow. Biased Go Cats,
but I know you're unbiased of course, So great having
you on the podcast.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
Thanks for having me anytime.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Awesome. Well another episode of Behind Kentucky Basketball. ESPN analyst
Jimmy Didykes joined us this week. I'm Michelle knez Vickim'll
see you next week.
We had a Mario on this podcast earlier this season
and he's he's from England. Then he played soccer growing up,
and he told me that a lot of his coaches,
you know, connect his passing ability in court vision to
him playing soccer growing up and being able to see
the pitch and now see the court. Yeah. And I
feel like when I saw him do that at Tennessee,
like came full circle. I'm like, wow, Wow, he can
(00:20):
really see and run a little bit at the point guard.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Yeah, he's a unique player. He's a hard matchup and
if if you are married to a system like Mark
Pope is, and I like that word married, like you
believe in at one hundred percent. He had to identify
the perfect guy in the portal and he did. You know,
there's some guesswork still involved in that portal when you
have to rapidly react to a guy that went in
(00:47):
and Mark saw something that that that that he wanted
and needed desperately, and Amar has filled those shoes well
for him.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Welcome into another episode of Behind Kentucky Basketball. This week,
I'm joined with ESPN analyst Jimmy Dikes. Jimmy, thanks so
much for stopping by our studios man, great studio, right,
I mean this is like ESPN top quality level what.
Speaker 2 (01:19):
You guys got here. So thank thanks for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Of course, I think I need to clip that and
like put that that might be a quote outside of
this door commercial. I was just talking to you, I said,
is this your fifth Kentucky game you've been on this season?
You're here for the Kentucky Arkansas game, fifth or sixth,
But you've got a chance to watch the cats up class.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
I have. Yeah, I've seen them. I've seen them at
times at the very best. Like I think back to
the gun Zaga game. At gunzag you know, they kind
of turned the corner in the second half and Jackson
Robinson had to take control of the point guard. And
been here for a couple of SEC Conference games. I've
had him on the road, had him at Vanderbilt didn't
go their way, and had him at Tennessee and it
did go their way. So I'm a big believer in Kentucky.
(01:57):
You know, offensively, there as good as anybody in the
colle game right now, and they're getting better defensively. The
numbers show with the film shows it, So I think
there's a lot of good stuff in front of this team.
Still get ready to get head into March here not
too far future.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
It's going to be yeah, before we know it, which
is crazy. You mentioned the recent game that you're on
in Knoxville, Kentucky Tennessee. Tennessee one of the best defenses
in the country. Rick Barnes always has them ready. Defensively,
Kentucky one of the best offenses in the country. Without
Lamont Butler, Andrew Carr was extremely limited. I think he
only played under two minutes or something in that game.
What maybe surprised you the most? You mentioned Jackson Robinson
(02:33):
had played a little point guard in Gonzaga. He had
to take over that point guard role again in Knoxville.
What did you like from the team and how do
you think they rose to the occasion without thanking you guys.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Yeah, well without a point guard, I mean you would
think is Kentucky going to be able to just get
into their offense? First of all, because Tennessee's the number
one defensive team in the country. They handled that. They
always got into their actions. Jack Jackson Robinson got it
into him. Some Amari Williams got him into their offense.
Some They had a low turn over game, you know,
without Lamont Butler, which was important, and I thought, I know,
(03:04):
Tennessee settled for some jump shots. They took forty five threes,
which is crazy for Tennessee to take that many threes.
I don't care who they're playing, but Kentucky had a
lot to do with it. I mean, they were they
were good guarding the ball, Michelle, they were good in
the gaps. I mean, they guarded Tennessee exactly like you
have to guard him. And Tennessee kind of also took
the bait. So I think is one of Mark's better
defensive games, especially on the road and conference play. And
(03:29):
then you know, they shot the ball well against Tennessee's defense,
which is not easy to do, and they got they
got some really good open looks, so, you know, and
they were coming in losers of I think back to
back games Alabama and Yeah, and you're looking at going
to Tennessee and then coming home to Arkansas, the emotions
of the game that that's going to entail. It felt
like kind of a must win for both of them, honestly,
(03:50):
and Kentucky got a great one. They did.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Yeah, you know, you talk about Vanderbilt, who had given
a loss to Tennessee and Kentucky heading into that game.
Other team that has has snuck into the top twenty five,
and you being able to cover a lot of these
SEC teams. I mentioned you've been on a lot of
Kentucky games, but really you've covered the entire league for
a very long time.
Speaker 3 (04:13):
Now.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
When you looked at this league at the beginning of
the year and now we're a little bit halfway there,
I mean, what have you seen from it? And how
incredible has this league been?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah? I thought before the season ever started the league
had a chance to get ten bids and that would
set a record for the SEC. I've ben about a
month into it. I thought that number could be higher.
I actually got called by one of my bosses, the
ESPN said, and you might want to back off that
a little bit aside. I believe it like I believe it.
And here we are now heading into February and all
(04:43):
the predictions are somewhere between eleven and thirteen teams. So Michelle,
it's the best the league's ever been. I mean, even
the three or four teams are going to finish in
the bottom of the SEC this year. They have future pros,
every one of them. Has one, you know, and great coaches,
and you know, the bases are totally into it now,
the student sections everywhere you go, Like basketball has just
(05:05):
risen up in a powerful league like the SEC. They
have fought their way through the football and all the
other things that can sometimes kind of push you to
the back. So it's going to be a record number
of teams from this league. I think there'll be a
record number of teams ever to come out of one
league for that NCAA tournament, a minimum of eleven. It
could be thirteen, which is a crazy number.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
I mean, that would be incredible. What do you think
the SEC Tournament will be like?
Speaker 2 (05:31):
Well, it's always a great event. I don't buy into
the narrative that winning the SEC Tournament is going to
be more difficult than winning the NCAA Tournament. The nca
Tournament is a beast. It is an absolute beast. You're
on neutral floors, traveling thousands of miles sometimes away from
your home campus, playing teams you've never seen all year.
(05:51):
That's the most difficult thing to win in college basketball.
The SEC Tournament this year will be the second most
difficult thing to win most likely, probably maybe even the
third most difficult because I think winning the regular season
over a two month grind, all the things you got
to go through to be the SEC regular season champ,
I think is probably more difficult than winning the tournament.
(06:14):
With that being said, the tournament's going to be spectacular.
I mean, even the opening games on Wednesday night, you're
going to have a team or two that still has
hope of a couple more wins we could get in
the NCAA tournament. Then certainly when you get into Thursday,
in the quarterfinals on Friday, it's going to be a
ranked team versus a ranked team.
Speaker 1 (06:31):
Well, and even thinking about it, on a Wednesday, you
could have a ranked team playing on that first day
of the SEC tournament. You know, I know we looked
at the league as a whole, but kind of circling
back into Kentucky, there was something that you mentioned that
you saw against Tennessee, and it was a Mary Williams
doing some of the ball handling and bringing the ball
up and really facilitating that offense. How unique is that
(06:52):
for you to see a seven foot or be able
to handle the ball that way and run an offense.
Speaker 2 (06:55):
Yeah, there, I don't see too many other teams in
college ball that has that built into their system. They
recruit that system. They got a guy that can play
it out with Amaro Williams. I mean against Tennessee, I
remember one possession he brought the ball the entire link
to the floor and we then drove it and scored
with a no past possession. So he's a big key
for this offense. I mean, you've got to have a
guy up top that can run what Kentucky calls zoom
(07:18):
action and all the things they do on the side
of the floor. So dominant rebounder, very good defender, Like
he keeps Kentucky from getting punked inside. And that's a
big deal in this league because if you don't have
someone with some size and some physical presence about you
that can drag other bigs away, it can happen to you.
(07:40):
And he's just as valuable as anybody on this Kentucky lineup.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
All right, listen, everybody, we need to take a brief
moment to thank our podcast sponsor UK Federal Credit Union,
as the official credit union of the University of Kentucky.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
UKFCU understands that students need support and that's why they've
created the Student Rewards Account which offers them five percent
cash back on all debit card purchases to students aged
thirteenth twenty five. Visit UKFCU dot org or stop by
one of their seven local branches to open an account.
Today bederally insured by NCUA.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
We had a Mari on this podcast earlier this season
and he's he's from England and he played soccer growing up.
And he told me that a lot of his coaches,
you know, connect his passing ability in court vision tim
playing soccer growing up and being able to see the
pitch and now see the court. Yeah, and I feel
like when I saw him do that at Tennessee, like
came full circle. I'm like, wow, Wow, he can really
(08:36):
see and run a little bit at the point guard position.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
Yeah, he's a unique player. He's a hard matchup and
if if you are married to a system like Mark
Pope is, and I like that word married, like you
believe in at one hundred percent. He had to identify
the perfect guy in the portal and he did. You know,
there's some guesswork still involved in that portal when you
have to wrap it react to a guy that went
(09:01):
in and Mark saw something that he wanted and needed desperately,
and Amari has filled those shoes well for him.
Speaker 1 (09:09):
So a coach Pope takes over this Kentucky program in
the spring has to put together this roster you mentioned,
look at the portal, identify players that he thinks can
all fit together. Maybe not the five best players or
the top of the portal, but the five players that
can all match and fit together. I remember that you
came to Kentucky in the off season and you were
(09:30):
torn or you were going to see different colleges to
get ready for the season to start. Walk me through
maybe what you remember from first coming here when Mark
Pope took over the program, and share anything you guys
talked about and your first impression.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
I guess yeah, I think it was. I think it
was around Pro Day. I don't know it was back
in it was early. It may have even been to September.
I just came into watching practice for a day, but
I left thinking that they're going to be good like
I saw. Okay, they got bigs. They got two guys
on the wings and Break Robinson. They can shoot as
well as anybody in college ball. They got a stud
(10:03):
at the point guard spot, and Butler Otega Olway is
a physical guy, driving like there's depth there, there's They're
coached hard. They play unique offensive system, which is different
than anyone else in this league other than I mean
Alabama's a little similar. I thought from day one they
were gonna have a very successful year. And you know,
I keep hearing people was picking them, Ah, they're going
(10:24):
to finish somewhere in the middle, and they might. They
still might with how the league came yeah, yeah, but
they could also win the National championship. Finishing five hundred
in the SEC this year, That's that's how good the
league is. Because twenty eleven, I believe, is when the
Big East put eleven teams in Yeah, uh, and Yukon
finished five hundred in league play that year and went
and won the National Championship. That you could have a
(10:47):
team somewhere in that five hundred, maybe a game above
or below at least get to the final four out
of the league this year.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
It's it's exciting, it's fun. But I think you know,
when you talk about the games, one thing that coach
Hope always says is the next game is the biggest game.
Because in the SEC, I mean, you can go to
a Vanderbilt, who is a team who wasn't ranked at
the time, But the next game is the biggest game
when you look at this game that you're about to
hop on the call. Obviously coach cal Perry is coming
(11:15):
back for the first time. This has happened before when
coach Patino was at Louisville he came back when Tubby
was the coach. Here anticipation around this game, I mean,
probably one of the biggest college basketball games in a
very long time. With coach cal coming back the next
season and Kentucky not going and playing at Arkansas this year.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Sure, it has to be one of the most confusing
times in the history of Big Blue Nation, because I
think there's still I mean, we're let all over twenty
four hours away from tip. I still think there's a
lot of people trying to figure out what do I do. Like,
I appreciate everything that coach cal did, the national championship,
the runner ups, all the great memories we had with
(11:55):
the fifty four straight wins in up when he first
got started, so many great memories, Like I want to
respect that and applaud that. But he's walking in with
a most likely erazorback red something on. He's now the
opposing coach of a team that we've had a little
bit of a rivalry with over the years. When you
go back to Nolan Richardson and how heated it was.
(12:16):
So I think there's some confusion on what do I do? Sure,
and it's gonna be an interesting, interesting time when he
walks in and gets introduced. But I do know this,
once the game starts, all that's all. That stuff doesn't matter.
It does not matter. Man, Kentucky better be playing at
their best. Arkansas better be playing at their best.
Speaker 1 (12:34):
When you hop on a call for a game that
has a lot of anticipation, or I mean a historic game,
do how much do you think about that? Do you
ever get nervous when you when you hop on the call.
I know you've been doing this for so long, but.
Speaker 2 (12:46):
The yeah, I don't know if nervous is the right word.
You know, you're always on edge a little bit. It
doesn't matter if I'm doing two teams that aren't even
ranked in the games on esp and U still you
get that right before you get on the air and
my prepare Do I have energy? You know all the
things that I go through, protection over my words, all
the things that I think about, pray about. It won't
(13:07):
be any different for this game. But you have to
put some thought into what what's my opinion on the night,
you know what, what? How do I want a word?
What I what I think about coach call and what
he did here and what Coach Pope's doing now and
and all those things. So, uh, there's yeah, there's some
extra preparation that goes into a big event game like this.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
Absolutely, you played basketball at Arkansas under coach Suton and
then coached here at Kentucky under him. What do you
remember about your time here on the coaching staff?
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Two of my fondest memories of my lifetime were the
two years that I were here. I mean, it's a
it's a special place. I was just talking with Coach
Pope about it. Like unless you've been inside that locker
room where Kentucky you know basketball has all all the
work goes goes down and just to feel for it
around here, you can't explain it to anyone, know, you
(14:00):
really can't. So I love my time here. I still
love the Bluegrass State. I love I love the horse Race,
I love Keenland, I love the basketball, I love the
passion that the fan base has. It's one of my
favorite places to come to do a game because you
know the product's always going to be good, it's always
going to be a big game. I can walk to
the I can walk to the arena, which is a
big deal when you're doing sixty games a year like
(14:21):
I am. So Lexington, Kentucky has and always have will
have a special place in my heart.
Speaker 1 (14:28):
Absolutely well, Jimmy, we love having you here. Thank good
luck on the call on the game tomorrow. Biased Go Cats,
but I know you're unbiased of course, So great having
you on the podcast.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
Thanks for having me anytime.
Speaker 1 (14:39):
Awesome. Well another episode of Behind Kentucky Basketball. ESPN analyst
Jimmy Didykes joined us this week. I'm Michelle knez Vickim'll
see you next week.
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