May 22, 2025 • 50 mins
Matt Jones sits down with Mark Pope to discuss his 1st season at Kentucky, his roster for the upcoming season and much more.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right here with Mark Pope. This is exciting for me.
It's our first chance to really sit down and have
a longer conversation because you've been on a whirlwind since
you got hired year one. Mark, thank you for coming
on KSR.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I'm so happy, man, Come on, you ready to rock?
Speaker 1 (00:16):
All right, Well, let's start with this. Last time we
talked was around this time one year ago. How has
year one been better, worse, different than you expected? How
would you sort of judge your first year at Kentucky?
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Jeez, I don't. It's so hard to say. I mean,
it's it's so much, right, it is. Uh, I mean
it's I say this all the time. It's the greatest
job in the world. And it's in the greatest community,
in the best fan base, and and I get to
work with the best administration, and I love this stuff
(00:53):
so much. And this season I got to work with
the greatest kids ever and and so and it's just
a NonStop It's like it's every it's every day.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
And do you like that? You like love it?
Speaker 2 (01:05):
I mean that's part of what makes it the best
job ever. And so, uh, I mean, it's it's there's
so much. Actually, I was talking about this with Leanne
Uh yesterday. It's just like it's hard to it's hard to.
Everything comes so fast, and there's so many incredible, incredible,
meaningful moments that you kind of think about. You want
(01:28):
to find a break in it. So you're like, well
if you just think about to like to two months ago,
and then trace trace just the last two months, but
then you cut out something right before that point that
was monumental, right, And so it's I love it. I
love being here, and I love that we get to
have this opportunity and I love Uh, there's just not
(01:50):
enough time. That's the thing that I feel over and over.
There's just not enough time. We need more time. But
but but the whole thing is zhilarating and it's wonderful,
and we have a very clear cut mission and a
job to do that no, we haven't even come close
to completing, and so we're just hungry, chasing every day
(02:11):
and enjoying everything along the way.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
I want to kind of go back to last year
then talk about Now you think.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
About last year when we were when we sat down
and talked, Yeah, everything we didn't know, like everything was
a hypothetical.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Yeah, And when I talked to you there. I think
I said to you in that conversation where you and
I were just sitting in your office, and I said,
this is gonna be interesting for Kentucky fans because.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
They don't know any guys.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
You're gonna have a team where they don't know anybody.
And I do remember wondering. Everybody loves Mark, but how
they gonna feel about these guys they don't know. And
it ended up becoming one of the more beloved teams
that I can remember. You knew the guys, but I
was surprised how much people just embraced that group.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Could you could they feel it? Yeah, our guys could
for sure. And I think is as much as I
was happy about that, I was happy that our guys
didn't miss it. Because the craziest thing is, like, and
this is almost incomprehensible to me, you could actually come
here for a year as a player and miss it,
Like you could miss the whole thing if you if
(03:09):
you came here and we talked to our to our
recruitis about this all the time. If you came here
and you were just only dialed into yourself, you could
actually miss the great uniqueness and like the monstrosity that
this experience can be. You could actually miss the whole thing,
Like you might take it in in a minute here,
in a minute there in a crowd here and whatever,
(03:31):
but you could miss it. And I felt like our guys,
I felt like one of the reasons why there was
such a great relationship between BBN and our players was
because our players also were really engaged in growing the relationship,
like they meant something to them from from our guys
coming in. You know, our guys logged almost four hundred
(03:52):
hours of community service, which is just a very separate,
little standalone niche. But their interest in like in in
in embracing the magnitude of this opportunity was pretty special.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
I thought part of it for the fans was the
fact that these they seemed to really appreciate the moment
to be here, the fact that they had played at
schools like Drexel and Dayton and all that made it
to where I felt like they were as grateful as
the fans want them to be grateful. Does that make sense?
And I think they love that.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Yeah, And I think that's what I'm saying about not
missing it. You know, I was I was at uh
just yesterday, I was in Brooklyn with No No in
the Bronx Sorry with with with Modiabat's mom, and you
think about MO. He's coming from Alabama. Alabama was in
a final four, and then the lad aid it's a
pretty good program, and just being we actually walked and
(04:45):
he came down and met us outside the building and
walked in and security was right there, and the kind
of lead security guard was losing his Mind's like, he's
like coach Bolp. He's like, I'm a diar Kentucky, you know,
the whole thing. And and then he knew he knew MO,
but he didn't know about the change. And so I
(05:07):
was like, no, you're gonna be watching MO. We're coming
here to play Michigan State this year and he was
like wait what Yeah, And and then spending you know,
spending some time with MOA's family. They get it too.
And it's not just the guys that were coming from
a mid major. I mean, he's coming from a from
a really good program. But but is already so ingrained
(05:27):
to him how different this is at Kentucky than anywhere else.
And he's going to come here with he's a beautiful man.
He's a beautiful human being. But he's going to come
here and he's not going to miss it either, Like
he's going to take it all into And so I
think we, I think we have the makings of a
of another group. Hopefully it's a staple for us forever,
of guys that really understand what this is.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Yeah, this is gonna be pretty well to be a
little bit of a different group. But let's get to
that in a second. Before I leave. Last year, I
want to go back to UH in Milwaukee. You beat
Troy in the first round, your your first NCAA tournament win,
and I I really there are certain things I always
am gonna remember when my career is over, and I'm
gonna remember watching you when that game was over, your
(06:11):
embrace of your wife, your embrace of your your family.
And then also the same thing after the Illinois game.
Those it felt like and maybe it'll feel like this
for you in all the future game tournament games you win,
But it felt like that was a moment you really
wanted to soak in. Am I right about that?
Speaker 2 (06:26):
Yeah, it's it's it's kind of the same thing we
started out talking About's just say, everything comes so fast
that you could miss all the moments. Yeah, and and
and all of us are driving so hard and it's
so relentless that you could miss the moments. And so
you know, I didn't want to miss it with my guys.
I didn't want to miss it with my family. I
didn't want to miss with the fans. You know. I
(06:49):
I it's just too good to miss. And so you
only get a few seconds. But but taking those few
seconds really, yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
That was that was a that was a really cool moment,
just even for me to be a part of. All Right,
so when you came here, we were all trying to
figure out, right, what is Mark Pope basketball? And now
we have a year of it. And I'll just take
on a personal level some things that surprised me. Maybe
we're a little different, And get your your take. I
watched you, b yu felt like you got shot zillion threes,
(07:15):
ended up not shooting as many as maybe we would
have have thought. Why do you think that was?
Speaker 2 (07:22):
It's poor coaching.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
Well I think you won plenty, but I was.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
Really disappointed with that. This year. It still eats me
a little bit. I'm like, oh, I just couldn't we
couldn't quite get there. I was really proud of the
product our guys put on the floor last year, and
I thought, with all things considered, I saw, I was
really proud of it. And we have so much room
to grow, Like we have so much more to do,
Like we left so much on the table that that
(07:48):
we weren't quite the team that I envisioned us being
when we're great. Injury though, right, part of an injury,
part of a coaching part of it, all the things,
part of newness, part of it, you know, part of it,
roster construction part it was all little pieces of it.
And like I said, I'm super proud of what the
guys did. I think it's incredible. It was. It was
(08:11):
a really amazing journey. But you know, you go to
that and you're like, man, we weren't even close to
what we're supposed to be, like what we're aiming to be,
And I think that gives you great hope for what
we can actually be.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
I mean, you had look you lo this car right
at the beginning of the year, Jackson Robinson's hurt on
and off, Lamont Butler's hurt on and off you, I
mean Andrew Carr's hurt on and off. I mean you
all had to deal with a lot of stuff. You
had guys playing roles you probably didn't think they were
going to play immediately, but you just kept fighting. And
I felt like outside of I thought Alabama was a
(08:44):
tough matchup for you, for you all, But besides that,
I felt like you were matched up and in all
those games you had to feel good about it. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
You know how I know that Alabama was a tough
matchup because I was just on the road this weekend
and went said and Natoates came a sady. I mean,
he was so happy, was he was so happy to
talk to me. He was like my best friend in
the whole world. That's what happens when you go zero
and three.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
Ah, But but that was I think it was just
tough when with the rosters you had to go in
those games.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
It was complicated. But you know it's it's yeah, but
that's all part of it. It's all built into it.
You know. We think we have some answers for when
when some things go wrong this coming season, Like you
learn and you grow and you get better, right, and
and that's what we're gonna do. Uh. With all that said,
you know, we we had you know we talked about
all the continuity issues and everything else, but you know,
(09:31):
I did. I do think we we learned a lot
last year. I think we grew a lot last year
as a staff. I think we grew as a team.
But dealing with the changes, what was what what we
also learned was just how massively important our guys getting
to know each other and love each other and trying.
You know, as a basketball player, you're the only reason
you're here is because you're completely obsessed with your own
(09:54):
personal development and growth. You can't get to Kentucky without
being like crazy, selfishly obsessed with yourself and how you grow,
because that's what it demands. Like this personal sacrifice scat
is so huge, and so we're not living in laala
land where guys are gonna completely divorce themselves from their
own ambitions. But what we're trying to do is build
(10:15):
a place where you're gonna go achieve your own ambitions
by by by becoming the greatest teammate ever and loving
your guys more than you can possibly imagine, because this
actually is by definition here and in the NBA, it
is a team sport and it's about a team. And
I thought that was what helped you know, our guys
(10:38):
being so good at doing that last year was what
helped us survive all the stuff that that kind of
went into the season.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
All right, some basketball nerd stuff a little bit. You
you were very big on that. Fans wondered about the
first substitution substitution pattern. They had a lot of games
where we go out, we get a lead, then you'd
make a sub and people, ah, what's he doing? What's
your philosophy on that on that early in the first
and second half bringing in some subs? What why do
(11:06):
you do that? Well?
Speaker 2 (11:08):
In the games where I brought in substitutions and it
went bad, it was just bad substitution, right. But sometimes
you know, when you're thinking about the whole nature of
the game, you you you so these are thoughts that
go into it, and it's it's pretty much artistic. You
lose the science of it really quick because there's such
a small sample size. But but it's it's you know,
(11:29):
a couple a couple of things going so, uh, when
we thought about our roster alignment, about guys that actually
function well together, or who we could have on the court,
who we felt you know, sometimes there's there's a young
guy that you're trying to put on the court where
you need to have them kind of protected, right, and
so sometimes it's hard to take a bunch of young
(11:49):
guys or less experienced guys and put them on the
court at the same time, and so sometimes you have
to grab someone out of the line up early to
get someone in so that you can start the rotation
early so you don't have a bunch of guys fatiguing
all at the same time, and then you're then you're
doing more wholesale or maybe a guy when he's fresh,
he's actually to be able to be more supportive than
when he s are. So you think about things like that.
You think about running through the roster to kind of
(12:11):
see who's got a good vibe that night, because there's
game to game differentiating. There es game for me you
do I think one hundred percent, and then the other thing,
you're trying to explore his matchups, because the vibe sometime
is really determined by the matchup about like what does
it look like? And sometimes you're thinking, man, I could
really function smaller in this game. Maybe maybe I could
get to smaller in this game against a particular lineup,
(12:35):
and so you're reactive to those things. Sometimes sometimes it's
just a matter of like, hey, I'm going to take
the hit now so I can be more fresh than
the second half, which was really effective for.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Us this year. You did have a lot of games
where it felt like at the end you guys had
some energy that the other the other team didn't. In
just looking at your roster for next year, and granted
I have not seen these guys play nearly as much
as you have most of them, but it does look
to me as an outside like you intently went to
get more athletic, and it was that? Was that true?
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Yeah? I think I think that we have. Positionally in
some positions, I think we're way more athletic, and I
think positionally in some places were way more physical, And
I think both those things matter.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Was that a going through the SEC and seeing I
always say about the SEC, especially last year, even the
worst teams in the SEC had great athletes. Was it like, Okay,
I gotta ramp the athleticism up a little bit? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (13:28):
I think it was. It's again, it's always like a
stew of of ideas, right. One of the things that
is functional for us is like positionally if you could,
you know, like a like a low hanging fruit, example
would be just the ability to switch one through four
defensively or one through five defensively. So can you get
(13:48):
more either more size or more quickness or more of
a steal percentage in your back court? And you can
you get you know, a four for example that's more
coultiple or actually could be a dominant defensive figure against
any matchup. Right, So you're kind of thinking about a
bunch of different pieces, Man, can we fit together? And
(14:09):
you're not gonna have your whole roster be able to
do that, but can we put together a lineup where
that's super functional? And how do we add pieces?
Speaker 1 (14:15):
Do that?
Speaker 2 (14:16):
You know, like you do that a thousand different models
of your rosha works together in terms of how you
want to scheme different things on the floor, as well
as just kind of looking individually at ones, two, three,
source fives and the standalone about how they function.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
So I see, again as an outsider with your system
that to me watching your one, the two positions that
seem like to me are the most important for you
are the point guard in the big, especially the big
that's at the top with amar a maris a very
unique ability. So you have I assume Brandon Garrison is
what you're thinking at that role. He had some great moments,
(14:53):
also had some inconsistent moments. I remember when you all
lost him, you saying something to him like all right,
this obvio and you know, here you go. You think
Brandon's ready to take that step up because it'll be
big shoes to fill with the mark.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Yeah. Well, first, you know, traditionally in my roster, probably
for most of my you know, most of my tenure
as a head coach, it's probably been the four that's
been a more unique piece. We slid into this five
roll kind of of necessity last year and and to
(15:29):
be a personnel group I had before I got to
get that kind of led me to the five a
little bit. It kind of changes, but a lot of
time it's been a four where I'm playing a four
that's an elite level ball handler, decision maker where where
it gives us some space and we can protect a
five a little bit. So those two pieces are interchangeable.
All of that leading to Brandon Garrison. So Brandon Garrison
(15:52):
showed me some signs in the last month and certainly
this summer where he is just like he is growing
up man, And it's so cool to see. It's the
best thing to see as a coach. But uh, he's
talking about what he wants to be. It's no longer
kind of what he is and who he is and
how he expect it's what he wants to become. You know,
(16:12):
he's he's he's done this publicly where he's talked about Amar,
that he was that that beg was blessed to have
this big brother Amary, that the kind of mentored him
and took care of him. Yeah, and that he kind
of wants to be that guy. And it's a change
now when you start to have guys talk about what
they would like to become, then you're like, oh, we
(16:35):
got something here, and he's definitely there.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
Man.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
So much of his space is that and we need
him to be great. Next Year's can be really important
because he's he's one of the few guys that are
coming back with a ton of experience and he's going
to teach everybody on the roster.
Speaker 1 (16:47):
Jalen Lowe I watched play a couple of times. Uh.
I watched him a lot when they played Louisville and
I remember thinking, boy, this guy's got some talent. He's
got some scoot. He can get by people, which something
I thought sometimes we had a hard time doing last year,
beating people off the dribble. He's also though he can
be all over the place. How do you take that talent,
(17:09):
which is immns and then make it work in a
system like yours?
Speaker 2 (17:12):
So super fun stand on him and you've probably seen this,
but so and it's I still haven't found the right
way to say this in short words. To give me
a minute here. So, Jalen Lowe was an elite levels
in terms of the raw stats, points, assist, everything else
he did in the game was really good. But he
wasn't a super efficient player last year. Yeah, part of
(17:33):
it was because he had to do a lot. It's
not a It's no takeaway from Pitt. Pitt's a great
program to do a great job was just a situation
that he was in. And so so one of the
things he did, he was in the ninetieth percentile in
the country, in the top ten percent of taking the
highest percentage of shots that were are in the bottom
(17:55):
twenty percent of shot quality. Oh that's a that's a
long analytical way of saying he took he made the
game so hard, or the game that was delivered him
was so harder. However, that happened like he was taking
some of them trying to make the hardest plays in
the game of basketball and make him over and over
and over again. Not incredibly dissimilar in some ways from
(18:17):
Lamont Butler. So Lamont Butler shot quality usage wasn't quite
a low shot bottom twenty percent. Shot quality usage wasn't
quite as significant when he came, but it was still
a little bit of that trend. He had never been
forty eight percent from two, he'd never been really above
thirty three percent from three. He comes here, he shoots
thirty nine point one percent from three on the season,
(18:38):
suffering half the season with a debilitating shoulder injury, and
was at fifty six percent from two at eight percentage
point jump in a super senior. And so much of
that was because he was humble enough and willing enough to, like,
let me rethink this game a little bit, so I
don't spend all my time trying to get better at
making impossible shots, but I actually manipulate this game and
(19:01):
work enough to earn myself great stuff. So now instead
of being instead of being in the top ten percent
of taking of usage of bottom twenty percent quality shots,
now I mean like the top ten percent of usage
of like twenty to eighty percent quality shots, right, And
that shift without improving your raw skill set can transform
(19:24):
your entire game. And so what we love is I
love seeing guys where I'm like, wow, with a little
bit of study and a little bit of humility and curiosity, like,
we can transform your So that's a really interesting crazy
because I was gonna ask you, that's a moneyball game.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
When the season is over, you have this porridge of
players to choose from. They're all over the place, and
you could choose, especially at Kentucky, you could choose a
lot of them. You got a lot of choices. How
do you sit there and say Cam Williams at Tulane
that's the kid I want? Like, how do you even
how do you come to the point of saying that?
(20:02):
Are you looking for things like that? Little inefficiencies you
can take advantage?
Speaker 2 (20:05):
Yes, Like, so you're always ask yourself what are you
good at coaching? Like what part of coaching are you
good at? Right? And it changes, So it changes based
on a guy's talent and based on it, but like
it's a it's a it's very much all sliding scales,
like you have one hundred sliding scales. But you're kind
of like, okay, this is this is what happened out
Jayalen Lowe had a terrific season last year, I mean
(20:28):
put up really incredible numbers. So that's that was the
number one reason why I came out on the radar.
But as you dig deeper into it, you're like, ooh,
you know what, like we could actually take credit for
him getting way better when it's really not. It's really
not that complicend. And and when you when you think
about Cam, I mean Cam was pretty easy for us.
(20:48):
I think about that three kind of four spot guy
that can really shoot it, really stretch the floor.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
But when you say it's easy for you, like I
remember when he committed, I had somebody close to you today,
here's the case for him, here's why he's awesome. But
if I hadn't talked to that person, I would have
seen the stats and gone, that's odd to me. So
how is it comes to you.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
To Well, it's it's a little bit like so because
we know what fits in our system. We know what works.
You know. To me, it's just to give you like
it was, you know, and things don't always work out
the way that you think they're going to, right. But
when we signed Ansley Almanor, there was a lot of
(21:28):
kind of questions and I was just like, ah, guys,
just wait, just wait and see. And now I didn't
I wasn't saying that he was gonna have the greatest
shooting season in the history of Kentucky basketball. That's not.
But what I was saying is like, no, you don't
understand the way he fits into our system. The way
we played was is very much an NBA style, Like
we've had players like him that come in here and
(21:49):
they are winning you games and you didn't anticipate it
because of the skill set he brings because it's a
piece that fits so well to what we do.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
I had learn about him because to Mario and now
we're at your pro deck. Yeah, and I like, I
give him a hard time about it because he was
I was like, I looked at Antsy Almanor, I'm guilty
of this and I went, I don't know about that dude,
Like I trust smart, but I don't know and I
and I used to joke, hey, Mario, this is your
favorite player, and then I saw it once the game starting,
(22:21):
I saw what you were. So that's what you're looking
for our pieces.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
And and and listen, this is Cam Williams.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
Now is he's an NBA.
Speaker 2 (22:28):
Yeah, he's the NBA piece, Like he's the NBA loves him.
So it's not like we have some genius insight into
like reading these guys, but like we I think we
have a pretty clear sense of how we'd like to
do things and how we like to function, and then
finding the guys that that suit that really well. And
Cam is one of these guys that he's gonna be
(22:49):
great wherever he goes and plays, but coming here where
we're really really gonna dig in and use the skills,
he's gonna be special. So it's all different.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
But so how do you find the dude from Croatia?
I mean, you know he played for by the way
he played the team. I don't you probably know this
when when Kentucky played in the Bahamas that we played
them and beat him by like night we played that team.
How did you end up with him?
Speaker 2 (23:11):
In fact, I'm gonna throw meets go under the bus.
So Misco is one of the top agents in all
of all of Europe, and so Misko, uh, you know,
had kind of been a party to setting up that game.
And then I guess when they got to the game,
there were a bunch of stipulations like you guys aren't
allowed to play so and so is so.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
He's not allowed to play zone.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
He's still bitter about losing by fifty of that game.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Uh but we I remember they not allowed to play zone. No. Yeah,
but but I mean you look and you go now
that we follow this guy, like, wow, how did you hit?
You got on your radar?
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Yeah, so you know, our staff does an unbelievable job
scouring everywhere and and and he's the guy that kind
of you know when you So he's in a developmental team,
megas a development mental team, So they play in a
professional league, but they're all developmental guys. So they bring
in really young guys and just raise them up playing
them against legitimate guys. And his length was super attractive
(24:11):
to us once we got on film, and his skill set,
his ability to push the ball in transition and kind
of make a decision on the floor, and then talking
to him was was really great. So you know, one
of the interesting things is we go through this portal
season is we talk to everybody. And the reason we
talk to everybody is because we actually don't know who
fits Kentucky. So we actually have to have multiple conversations
(24:33):
not just with the player, but with the team around
them to understand if they fit here. There's so many
guys that don't fit Kentucky this place.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Is do you sometimes have to go meet them to know.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
That sometimes, but we don't always have that. You know,
I'm a FaceTime zoom guy, so I want to be
even with that.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Though. Have you had meetings where you had the FaceTime
and went, yeah, I just don't think.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
This work for one hundred percent. Yes, So that happens.
This is a special so special place. So it happens
more often than not that that we're a little bit
in and we're like, ah, like, you know, I might
love his time and be like, oh, he's not gonna
survive here, or I might I might love you know
him as a kid, but think, ah, his agenda is
(25:16):
just different than our agenda. And so you know, that
process is really important, and that was one of the
one of the really important parts of the process with
Andrea because I liked him. You know, you never know,
like we'll see how some of the skills that translates,
some of the physicality translates, some of some of those
things translate. But as we were exploring all those things,
(25:38):
which I was so excited about, all those pieces, when
I started talking about on the phone and like it
was one particular conversation on FaceTime where I'm talking to
him and you could see him get emotional as he
started to talk about the possibility of playing at the
University of Kentucky, and I'm like, that's it. That's our guy, right,
because he's gonna get it. He's not gonna miss it.
(25:59):
As the head coach here running this program, I cannot
bring guys in here that are gonna miss this. It
would feel like I'm disrespecting this place that I love
so much. And sometimes like uber talented guys could come
here and miss this. But I think the guys are
gonna serve us well as a community and a commonwealth.
And is is that this this this incredible? You know,
(26:21):
the pro the flagship program all college basketball, or the
guys that have come here and not miss it, and
those are the guys who actually hang banners forks.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
You know, you having played here, you know what it
means to people to have dudes from Kentucky. And you
are going to have three on this year's team, which
has gotta be one of the most. Ryan sitting over there,
I mean, there are not many times we've had more
than three.
Speaker 2 (26:43):
I'm so, I'm so proud of Ryan for having his
shirt on. Still this is I'm really proud of you. Man.
That's actually super cool.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
A few minutes, but you from last year's team, you
had Trent Noah, you had Travis Parry. Trent's coming back.
Everybody's excited when the when the Travis thing doesn't work
out and he ends up going what is your like,
how's that play out? Because you know what dudes from
Kentucky mean to the fan base.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
I know, so this is the thing, so you know,
a bunch of things can be true at the same time.
Travis Travis Perry is special, special, special like he had
just is and he's a big time basketball player and
he's gonna have a big time career. He's gonna be
a terrific player and he's such a joy to coach.
I mean, he just you know, took an information and
(27:30):
just wanted to get better. And and he's got this
seriousness about him that's pretty unflappable. And I just think
he's got so many of the components of being a
great basketball player. So and and I love coaching him,
and that's all true. And so sometimes I get cautious
about when he told me that he was leaving. We
actually were having an ongoing conversation. I was trying to
(27:50):
like help him see what I saw, and you know,
we just just didn't get to the same place. I
was super It was devastating. I mean, it's actually like
it hurts my soul now just because.
Speaker 1 (28:04):
I so you really tried to convince him.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Oh man, I just desperately want him to stay and
and and and and Travis Perry loves Kentucky. So that
that's when I say, I want to be sensitive, like
he loves Kentucky. It's just he just you know, I
would never want to put words his mouth, but I
think probably he was just not feeling super confident about
the path for him here at Kentucky being exactly what
(28:29):
he wanted out of the game of basketball. Maybe I
couldn't have disagreed with him more on that. But you know,
at the end of the day, we're all just making
our best. Guess. I just know and so and and listen,
he's gonna go to Ole miss and he's gonna have
a great career there, and he's gonna do it he's there,
and yeah, he's a terrific player and and and all
(28:51):
those things are true. I just know that being a
Kentucky basketball player is so much bigger than being a
basketball player. And and it's my job to help our
guys see that and understand it and and feel it
and and and and you know it sometimes as old people,
(29:15):
it's so much easier for us to see ten years
and twenty and thirty years down the road than it's
just for young guys. And and so there's no so
it just it just just all of that just man,
it just it breaks my heart. But I'm also I
love I love Travis and and he's gonna have a
great run and all those things are all true.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
At the same time, I'm gonna read you what Ryan
Lemon just texted me. All right, So now I got
to give you the part where we give you a
hard time. We have a little thing on the show
where we talk about how much you say special and
how much you say beautiful. Man and Ryan just said
Pope throughout the trifecta special. Travis Perry is special, special, special.
You love those words beautiful and special.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
Don't don't be don't be mad at me. I'm not
mad at you because Leanne crushes me. She's like, well,
you stop saying beautiful. At one point I was saying breathtaking.
She's like, stop saying you say. She's like, could you
please grow your lexicon so you can have some other
works of sayers special and beautiful and.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Beautiful is a big one. You're big. I'm beautiful.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
I'm actually gonna I'm actually gonna put a card down
here with some some some synonyms for for for my hyperbology.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
You know, some people have a cuss jar. You need
to have a beautiful and special jar, so they have
to put a dollar in uh every time. Let me
ask you some philosophy things about things I know Kentucky
fans care. Well, let's talk about scheduling real quick. You
have made and we don't even know all the schedule yet,
but like it's gonna be a hard schedule here. I mean,
you know, when you we start the Indiana series back,
(30:44):
we got the Saint John's game where they're replacing in
the Champions Classic, there'll be an ACC team come here.
I'm rooting for Duke, although I hear it's gonna be
something else, which disappoints me, but that's not your control.
And now you got these two preseason games perdue and
today was announced Georgetown. You really believe in Let's go
play the best, right? I mean?
Speaker 2 (31:04):
This is this? Yeah, you guys are hear me say this,
until as long as I get to be here. You know,
if you're coming to Kentucky, you don't come here and hide.
It doesn't make sense to come here and hide. Like
we're gonna grow. We have some by games where we're
gonna have a chance to grow and and do whatever.
But like this is you know, if you'll let me.
(31:24):
I spent the entire weekend and then I'm going to
the SEC meetings next week and all I can talk
about is we got to expand this over thirty one games.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
I agree, like we have got to.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
Expand this season, guys, because what's happening is especially with
the revenue share. Now, like the revenue share should change
everything in terms of our opportunity to actually go share revenue. Right,
let's get to you know, I keep saying forty and
everyone's mad at me. I'm gonna keep pushing forty. But
can we get to thirty five? Imagine if we had
(31:54):
four extra games? Yea, then we can put on our
schedule where we go play a big time neutral game
and set up a home and home and and and
do an in state game that people here really care about,
and just give us a little more flexibility in this deal.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
I just think, well, what's the downside? I mean I
used to say, like, well, you don't want to have
games during Christmas break? But who cares? Now? I mean
at this point, like why not?
Speaker 2 (32:20):
But this is the thing is those are the greatest games.
And listen, if you know every kid is inspiring and
go play in the league. Yeah, one year from now,
they're gonna be playing a Christmas Day game and their
whole family's gonna come. You know, with nil, Now you
fly your family in for the Christmas Day game. You
want to be a pro, let's be a pro. Right,
(32:40):
And I even if you keep a three day window
right now they have this three day window, It's fine.
You know, people argue about that. People, you don't have
to make the season longer. Give us an extra week
in the season, that's fine.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
But to simper you all play, it's like once a
week a lot of times, right.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
And we have six weeks of practice leading up to it. Anyway, Yeah,
extend out a little, just to double down on this
whole on this whole insanity. You know, we'll get our
guys in the summer, and our guys every college basketball
player is making more probably than their parents right now. Okay,
And the incredible thing is that during the summer, these
(33:18):
guys are getting paid a significant amount of money and
they're only allowed to work four hours a week, and
the guys are dying. They're like, can we please, you know,
can we please get together and get some work done?
Like the all the whole thing is starting ouside it
but I'm getting.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
Them, know, actually think that it makes perfect sense.
Speaker 2 (33:38):
So all of that leads me back to, like, can
we please extend this season because you know what, we
get Purdue and Georgetown, which is awesome in the non conference,
but come on, man, let us do a home a
home with Kansas, Like yes, So, like, why am I
not going to stores to play a game, like we
should be up.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Some more.
Speaker 2 (33:58):
We need some more flexibility this and also like we
have to like let us get to Maui.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
Now.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Part of the complication is is that we make so
much revenue off our home games that I'm locked into
this twenty game home slate. We have to do that
to pay the bills for us and for the athletic department,
which is good. That's a good thing. It's fine, it's great.
Bring on some more flexibility so we play some more
games that every school could actually bring in some more
(34:25):
revenue that we can share with these student athletes, that
we can share with the rest of athletic department.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Let's go, well, they have some of those tournaments now
where the players get revenue, and I would think that's
probably helpful in recruiting if you can play in them.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Right, and our guys do better academically. It's the time
tested proven our guys do better academically during the season
than they do out of season. So let's make the
season the whole school year. Our guys will be four
point those students, they're.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
All gonna be academic starts.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
I'm gonna brag about this. Our guys that we were
three point five GPA team nice this year. I'm super
proud of our guys academically. Out to Michael Stone. Does
everybody it'd be another A lot of people do. Yeah,
Michael Stone is a legend. If you take your mom
and you multiplier by ten, that is Michael Stone. He
is relentless. I mean this guy, he is the greatest
(35:17):
to ever do this job.
Speaker 1 (35:18):
Man.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
I love him.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
So. The only downside I've seen about your tenure is
and I hear this from Louisville fans too, so like
I loved at times how much Kentucky and Louisville hated
each other, Cal and your old coach wanted to stab
each other and still do whether whether they say it
or not. But you and Pat Kelsey are too nice.
Like the Louisville fans don't hate you. We don't really
(35:41):
hate Pat Kelsey. That's the only thing I got to
get you to spice up the Louisville rivalry a little bit.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
I hate this Pat Kelsey and all of those Louisville fans.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
Hay, No, now here's the thing.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
I'm gonna tell you this. You know it's actually super cool?
Speaker 1 (35:56):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (35:57):
Is that I got a boatload respect for Pat Helle. Okay,
I got so much. I think he's what he's what
he did last year was incredible. Yes, And I mean
two of my guys played for him last year, right,
and and what they accomplished and and you know, I
don't I don't have a ton of interaction with the
little fanibies, but I'm sure they're great. But but here's
the thing. I actually the one thing I would say
(36:19):
is that that I actually think I think that this
that this Kentucky Louislle thing is just gonna get heated
and heated. You know, it's gonna get heated because it's
gonna be back to being like one verse four in
the contret.
Speaker 1 (36:32):
No, they're gonna be good and they and they have
the nisle to participate, and I think that's gonna be Yes. Yeah,
well you get you get to go in there next year.
You'll get a sense of I think they're gonna be
cussing at you like they used to cuss me.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
They would never, they would not do that.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
I've had some blank Matt Jones chance from the student section,
so I think, uh, maybe you'll get that as well. Okay,
So going into year two, you made a that was
like we want to be the best in everything, and
you basically said and then included we're gonna be the
We're gonna pay the most, We're gonna do this, We're
gonna do that. I thought that was a really interesting statement.
A lot of coaches want to downplay the future and
(37:12):
kind of go we want you're you're just embracing like
we're gonna be the top and we're gonna have to
do that.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
It's Kentucky, Like, you know what, Guys like, I'm not
gonna be the guy that comes to Kentucky as the
head coach and somehow lowers the expectations of this place. Man,
we're trying to win this whole thing. Like we failed
at our job last year. You know you believe that
one hundred percent. Like we listen. If I know myself,
for the last thirty years, I've been a diehard Kentucky fan.
(37:40):
If we didn't went out, Like what is wrong with
that coach? Man? He can't win to Kentucky. That's what
all my guys are saying to me every single day.
And so like I'm not unrealistic. I understand the reality.
But we're supposed to listen, we are blessed. I'll tell
you the one thing that nobody in the world will deny. Okay,
you can't actually argue we have the great fan base
(38:01):
in all of college basketball. There's no one any other
fan base that would argue that. Nobody can argue that.
And so that fan base deserves the best of everything.
And so you go down the list, and we're trying
to be the best at everything. And that's what Kentucky
is supposed to be. That's what Kentucky has traditionally been.
Speaker 1 (38:19):
That's what you know.
Speaker 2 (38:20):
I was just with I was just with Karl Anthony
Towns yesterday in New York. And that's what he expects
out of this joint and and and that's what Antons
cars yesterday. Yeah, I mean it's what that's what all
our foreigner players, former coaches, you know what you know,
that's what Cal expects. I mean, Cal is that Arcis.
He's like, don't you ruin my program?
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Man?
Speaker 2 (38:39):
That's the best song I wanted to all of basketball.
Speaker 1 (38:41):
I wondered when you got here? Here was here was
a worry I had not about you as a coach.
But you know, Kentucky fans, I think we're ready for
a different thing. But they do love that. We have
twenty six guys in the NBA and they love those
guys and they watch them. They still feel very connected.
And there was a part of me that goes, well,
those guys still, you'll embrace this new coach, this new era.
(39:02):
And then I saw Andrew Harrison, who's not in the pros,
but said he watched more UK games this year than
he had in years past. And I've seen you, you know, talking,
and Devin Booker gave you a compliment and all these
was that important to you to keep that bond with
all those NBA guys and all those guys that played
for Cal.
Speaker 2 (39:20):
Well, it's listen. I mean guys played for Cal and
they played for Tubby and played for Jobie and and
and so those relationship Listen. You develop a really special
relationship with your head coach, like every player does. That
should never go away. Like I mean, I played for
coach Patino. Coach Patino is is is is coaching at
(39:41):
Saint John's. I'm not gonna wear Saint John's T shirt,
but but I love Coach Patino. I say that from
the rooftops. I'll shot it from the rooftops, if you know,
I was out a little quieter when he was coaching
at Louisville, but otherwise, like so that relationship is always
gonna exist. But but here's the thing, just like we
were talking about with TP right, I am thirty years
(40:03):
down the road, and I know what it feels like
to walk back into Rupp Arena with your family and
to let your children see this place that changed the
trajectory of your life forever, and it means something. It
was actually super you know, I don't know if Carls
gonna get mad at me, but I was with him
yesterday and he talked that's what he talked about. He's
(40:26):
actually so forward thinking that he's already thinking about legacy.
And so he was talking about one day when he
brings his children back to Kentucky and that they get
to see because the truth is that we all stop
playing and then the next guy's become way cooler to
our kids. Yeah, and then you get to walk back
into the gym and you get to see this relationship
(40:49):
that our thirty year old, you know, thirty years ago
played and played in Kentucky, Jersey. You still feel see
how people embrace them and you get to walk in
with your children and they get to feel that and
they get to see you on a light that they
never actually saw you cool. And that's a real thing.
Speaker 1 (41:08):
And I know that.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
I mean, I got to play in the league as
a bad player for a long time. I know what
it's like. And so I want every single coach, every
single one, and every single player that ever played here
to feel like this is their building because they built it,
like we get to enjoy it right now. I get
to be the head coach at Kentucky enjoying this because
(41:30):
of what Kat and what Antoine and what Tony and
what Kyle Macy and what Joby, what all those guys built.
That's what I get to enjoy right now. And so
it's really important to me that every single person that
ever wore this jersey or walked the East sidelines always
feels like this is home, because that's what BBN does.
That's how BBN is.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
Man.
Speaker 2 (41:51):
There's no fan base like it. You know, you finished,
you put on this jersey, and thirty years from now,
whether you were the best player on the team or
you're coming off the bench for two seconds at the
end of the last game of the conference season, they
will remember you and cherish you because you shared an
experience together.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Yeah, John Wall, who It's crazy to me, but it
almost gets me emotional to hear John Wall talk about
how excited he is about you. Like, that's a great
sort of melding of time. Dev's giving me the look.
So I got one more question. So let me do
this quickly. You went to London on Sunday. You saw
that devastation down there, which I also saw on Saturday,
(42:30):
and then we took the show on Monday. It is
very hard to describe pictures in video. Don't do it justice.
You were there. I know that had to have had
an effect on you.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
Yeah, it's so I mean, man, I had so many
you know, I was only there for six hours. On Saturday,
I was in Omaha and Memphis recruiting, and I called
I heard heard about reports, and so I called Shep
and I was just like, you know what what you know?
And everything's happened in real time on the ground. So
(43:03):
she was like, I don't know, man, We're still racing
around trying to find out what's what and who's who
and how we can help and who needs help? And
so he texted me. I got back late that ninety
he text me and said, Hey, there's a place where
I'm going to go tomorrow with a few people, and
we're just going to try and actually just try and
help one house, right, to help one family. And so
(43:25):
he gave me an address and we actually we actually
got there early that morning. I took a couple of
daughters and then a couple of their friends and we
ended up parking a few hours away because there was
so much stuff, and we got out of the car
and we actually never made it to the house we
were supposed to go to because we got out of
the car. And I'm gonna just say that first days,
but a senior couple maybe or late seventies, early eighties,
(43:49):
Catherine and Jerry, were outside their house. There was a
bunch of trees that had fallen on their roof, a
huge trailer that I think had blown from the airport
and flipped over right pushed against the side of ours.
It was just absolute chaos, and they were outside kind
of like trying to pick up stuff, and so we
just stopped right there and we just started helping them.
(44:09):
And then he grabbed a little chainsaw and he started
cutting off a little branches these trees. We started taking
it down and then you know what was really miraculous.
Just to give you all emphasized the hopeful side of
this was it seemed like every half an hour, a
new group a couple people showed up. And by the
time we finished, you know, six hours later, we removed
(44:31):
all these trees from off their house. We had probably
four chains. I was working. The big guns came in
and we had a big h you know kind of
uh forklift that came in. It was helping to lift
trees and and uh. And there was a family that
was really special to me from Paduca that that had
just they had just come and parked and walked into
(44:52):
the front yard after us, and I was like, do
you guys know the family where He was like, no,
we were in Paduca when things were really tough four
or five years. People came helped us. So when we
heard about we got in the car and we drove
out here and we're like we're gonna like, we're gonna
go pay it, pay it, pay it forward right kind
of thing. And he was just like and then when
we we when we left, we're trying to drive out
(45:14):
and I kid you not. There was a like a
it was a it was a parking lot for like
a mile with people coming into town. And we drove
by a gas station. There's two people out there with
signs that are like they just had science scribbled the
magic mark er free food. So you know, you just
inviting people to come stop buying and if they if
(45:35):
they need some food. And the point is like, there's
so much work to be done, and it's like, you know,
all of us that go in the you know, like
we went in the first day, and so that's all great,
but they're gonna be fighting us for the next years, right,
and so the continuity of help and care for this
community really is really important. But it was I'm telling you,
it's it's Kentucky. It's Kentucky, man, the same vibe that
(45:58):
we have in BBN, where there's this it's just this
connection point like people in the state. From my vantage point,
like we are great at loving our neighbor like people
love their neighbors man. And that's to me, that's a
gospel principle that's so important. But it's something that we
see lived out in the lives of people here and
and Kentucky's had way more than his fair share of
(46:20):
natural disaster over the last couple of years. But it
was as Biancy and I saw you guys down there,
and I and and uh, you know what, I'll give
you a little sid of hair because I think it's
so cool. So you know, I know you guys, I
think you were on air live there. But I saw
some social media stories that you guys did where people
were telling their story and I want to expand this
(46:41):
just as this connection point. So I had some guys
coming to my office like a month ago. I haven't
had a chance to tell you this, and they this gentleman,
incredible artist, just an amateur artists. He got a real job,
but he's just he's just and so he did this
incredible painting from the from the press conference a year ago,
and he brought the office and this was what was
(47:02):
super cool. So it was him and he brought his
four buddies and there but my age there fifty right,
and and and kind of gave me this gift. So
we're sitting down talking in the office and so we
got to this point where they're like, ah, man, we
just you know, when I get up in the morning.
The first thing I do is be like, what's you know,
what's going on new? And then then I'm listening to KSR,
you know, while I'm working, and then you know, I
(47:24):
get home and after dinner, I'll go check and see,
you know, what else is happened with the cats and
the whole thing. And it's this connection point, the same
thing we're talking about that you guys do an incredible
job providing is is. And I say this all the time.
It's like, it doesn't really matter if you say something
bad about me or good about me, or bad about
(47:44):
the cats or good about the cats. What matters is
that there's all these people coming to the well. So
I got to I've been. I had a chance to
go to Africa so many times and do some service
trips there and in these communities though, well, in these villages,
the well is where you always find people because everybody
(48:05):
is constantly throughout the day. You have to go, you
have to leave your hut and you walk across the
village and you go to the well to collect waters
happening all throughout the day. And so the well is
a special place because it's where everybody gathers and everybody interacts,
and you guys do an unbelievable job. And I thought
it was so special that you guys went down there
and and just like brought the well there too where
(48:27):
everybody can see. That's super cool, man. I appreciate you
doing that. Well.
Speaker 1 (48:30):
I want to thank you. I'll let you go, but
I want to say this set with you a year ago,
and I told you that before you had gotten hired.
I was kind of like, you know what, I might
be done with this, and you said to me, And
at that point I decided to stay. But you said
to me, you begged me to do I was I
was like, you don't have to beg me. I'm going
to do it. But you have. This is the fan
(48:54):
Matt talking, not the radio host. You have rejuvenated the
love of this People always loved the basketball, people always
wanted to win all that, but you have rejuvenated the
thing where there's a pride, there's a self esteem that
comes with being a part of it, and there's that collectiveness.
In a state that's had a lot of difficulties historically,
(49:16):
but especially in the last few years, this is that
center point. And I've watched people who had kind of
gone you know, I don't know if college sports are
for me anymore. And you brought all that back, and
these those players brought that back, and that is a
really special thing. So just as somebody who talks to
the fan base, thank you for that, because there's a
(49:38):
lot of people who said to me, last year was
one of my favorite years being a Kentucky fan. And
I think we'll look back at last year the way
we look back at some of those early Rick teams,
the John Waldon, Marcus Cousins cal team, like the you
got everybody back, and I think that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (49:55):
So let's say let's run back this year. I think
I think we got a chance.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
Man.
Speaker 2 (49:58):
I think I think we're gonna fall and love with
this team. And I think these guys, you know, the
the the DNA of this team. By definition, we have
a crew of guys that are like hungry to compete.
We don't have anybody that's running away from it. Like
everybody that's on this roster is hungry to come compete.
I think they all get Kentucky and they're excited embrace it.
(50:20):
I think there's gonna be a fun ride, man. I
can't wait.
Speaker 1 (50:22):
Take it with your appreciate.
Speaker 2 (50:24):
Okay, let's go.
All right here with Mark Pope. This is exciting for me.
It's our first chance to really sit down and have
a longer conversation because you've been on a whirlwind since
you got hired year one. Mark, thank you for coming
on KSR.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I'm so happy, man, Come on, you ready to rock?
Speaker 1 (00:16):
All right, Well, let's start with this. Last time we
talked was around this time one year ago. How has
year one been better, worse, different than you expected? How
would you sort of judge your first year at Kentucky?
Speaker 2 (00:31):
Jeez, I don't. It's so hard to say. I mean,
it's it's so much, right, it is. Uh, I mean
it's I say this all the time. It's the greatest
job in the world. And it's in the greatest community,
in the best fan base, and and I get to
work with the best administration, and I love this stuff
(00:53):
so much. And this season I got to work with
the greatest kids ever and and so and it's just
a NonStop It's like it's every it's every day.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
And do you like that? You like love it?
Speaker 2 (01:05):
I mean that's part of what makes it the best
job ever. And so, uh, I mean, it's it's there's
so much. Actually, I was talking about this with Leanne
Uh yesterday. It's just like it's hard to it's hard to.
Everything comes so fast, and there's so many incredible, incredible,
meaningful moments that you kind of think about. You want
(01:28):
to find a break in it. So you're like, well
if you just think about to like to two months ago,
and then trace trace just the last two months, but
then you cut out something right before that point that
was monumental, right, And so it's I love it. I
love being here, and I love that we get to
have this opportunity and I love Uh, there's just not
(01:50):
enough time. That's the thing that I feel over and over.
There's just not enough time. We need more time. But
but but the whole thing is zhilarating and it's wonderful,
and we have a very clear cut mission and a
job to do that no, we haven't even come close
to completing, and so we're just hungry, chasing every day
(02:11):
and enjoying everything along the way.
Speaker 1 (02:12):
I want to kind of go back to last year
then talk about Now you think.
Speaker 2 (02:15):
About last year when we were when we sat down
and talked, Yeah, everything we didn't know, like everything was
a hypothetical.
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Yeah, And when I talked to you there. I think
I said to you in that conversation where you and
I were just sitting in your office, and I said,
this is gonna be interesting for Kentucky fans because.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
They don't know any guys.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
You're gonna have a team where they don't know anybody.
And I do remember wondering. Everybody loves Mark, but how
they gonna feel about these guys they don't know. And
it ended up becoming one of the more beloved teams
that I can remember. You knew the guys, but I
was surprised how much people just embraced that group.
Speaker 2 (02:48):
Could you could they feel it? Yeah, our guys could
for sure. And I think is as much as I
was happy about that, I was happy that our guys
didn't miss it. Because the craziest thing is, like, and
this is almost incomprehensible to me, you could actually come
here for a year as a player and miss it,
Like you could miss the whole thing if you if
(03:09):
you came here and we talked to our to our
recruitis about this all the time. If you came here
and you were just only dialed into yourself, you could
actually miss the great uniqueness and like the monstrosity that
this experience can be. You could actually miss the whole thing,
Like you might take it in in a minute here,
in a minute there in a crowd here and whatever,
(03:31):
but you could miss it. And I felt like our guys,
I felt like one of the reasons why there was
such a great relationship between BBN and our players was
because our players also were really engaged in growing the relationship,
like they meant something to them from from our guys
coming in. You know, our guys logged almost four hundred
(03:52):
hours of community service, which is just a very separate,
little standalone niche. But their interest in like in in
in embracing the magnitude of this opportunity was pretty special.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
I thought part of it for the fans was the
fact that these they seemed to really appreciate the moment
to be here, the fact that they had played at
schools like Drexel and Dayton and all that made it
to where I felt like they were as grateful as
the fans want them to be grateful. Does that make sense?
And I think they love that.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Yeah, And I think that's what I'm saying about not
missing it. You know, I was I was at uh
just yesterday, I was in Brooklyn with No No in
the Bronx Sorry with with with Modiabat's mom, and you
think about MO. He's coming from Alabama. Alabama was in
a final four, and then the lad aid it's a
pretty good program, and just being we actually walked and
(04:45):
he came down and met us outside the building and
walked in and security was right there, and the kind
of lead security guard was losing his Mind's like, he's
like coach Bolp. He's like, I'm a diar Kentucky, you know,
the whole thing. And and then he knew he knew MO,
but he didn't know about the change. And so I
(05:07):
was like, no, you're gonna be watching MO. We're coming
here to play Michigan State this year and he was
like wait what Yeah, And and then spending you know,
spending some time with MOA's family. They get it too.
And it's not just the guys that were coming from
a mid major. I mean, he's coming from a from
a really good program. But but is already so ingrained
(05:27):
to him how different this is at Kentucky than anywhere else.
And he's going to come here with he's a beautiful man.
He's a beautiful human being. But he's going to come
here and he's not going to miss it either, Like
he's going to take it all into And so I
think we, I think we have the makings of a
of another group. Hopefully it's a staple for us forever,
of guys that really understand what this is.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
Yeah, this is gonna be pretty well to be a
little bit of a different group. But let's get to
that in a second. Before I leave. Last year, I
want to go back to UH in Milwaukee. You beat
Troy in the first round, your your first NCAA tournament win,
and I I really there are certain things I always
am gonna remember when my career is over, and I'm
gonna remember watching you when that game was over, your
(06:11):
embrace of your wife, your embrace of your your family.
And then also the same thing after the Illinois game.
Those it felt like and maybe it'll feel like this
for you in all the future game tournament games you win,
But it felt like that was a moment you really
wanted to soak in. Am I right about that?
Speaker 2 (06:26):
Yeah, it's it's it's kind of the same thing we
started out talking About's just say, everything comes so fast
that you could miss all the moments. Yeah, and and
and all of us are driving so hard and it's
so relentless that you could miss the moments. And so
you know, I didn't want to miss it with my guys.
I didn't want to miss it with my family. I
didn't want to miss with the fans. You know. I
(06:49):
I it's just too good to miss. And so you
only get a few seconds. But but taking those few
seconds really, yeah.
Speaker 1 (06:54):
That was that was a that was a really cool moment,
just even for me to be a part of. All Right,
so when you came here, we were all trying to
figure out, right, what is Mark Pope basketball? And now
we have a year of it. And I'll just take
on a personal level some things that surprised me. Maybe
we're a little different, And get your your take. I
watched you, b yu felt like you got shot zillion threes,
(07:15):
ended up not shooting as many as maybe we would
have have thought. Why do you think that was?
Speaker 2 (07:22):
It's poor coaching.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
Well I think you won plenty, but I was.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
Really disappointed with that. This year. It still eats me
a little bit. I'm like, oh, I just couldn't we
couldn't quite get there. I was really proud of the
product our guys put on the floor last year, and
I thought, with all things considered, I saw, I was
really proud of it. And we have so much room
to grow, Like we have so much more to do,
Like we left so much on the table that that
(07:48):
we weren't quite the team that I envisioned us being
when we're great. Injury though, right, part of an injury,
part of a coaching part of it, all the things,
part of newness, part of it, you know, part of it,
roster construction part it was all little pieces of it.
And like I said, I'm super proud of what the
guys did. I think it's incredible. It was. It was
(08:11):
a really amazing journey. But you know, you go to
that and you're like, man, we weren't even close to
what we're supposed to be, like what we're aiming to be,
And I think that gives you great hope for what
we can actually be.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
I mean, you had look you lo this car right
at the beginning of the year, Jackson Robinson's hurt on
and off, Lamont Butler's hurt on and off you, I
mean Andrew Carr's hurt on and off. I mean you
all had to deal with a lot of stuff. You
had guys playing roles you probably didn't think they were
going to play immediately, but you just kept fighting. And
I felt like outside of I thought Alabama was a
(08:44):
tough matchup for you, for you all, But besides that,
I felt like you were matched up and in all
those games you had to feel good about it. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
You know how I know that Alabama was a tough
matchup because I was just on the road this weekend
and went said and Natoates came a sady. I mean,
he was so happy, was he was so happy to
talk to me. He was like my best friend in
the whole world. That's what happens when you go zero
and three.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
Ah, But but that was I think it was just
tough when with the rosters you had to go in
those games.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
It was complicated. But you know it's it's yeah, but
that's all part of it. It's all built into it.
You know. We think we have some answers for when
when some things go wrong this coming season, Like you
learn and you grow and you get better, right, and
and that's what we're gonna do. Uh. With all that said,
you know, we we had you know we talked about
all the continuity issues and everything else, but you know,
(09:31):
I did. I do think we we learned a lot
last year. I think we grew a lot last year
as a staff. I think we grew as a team.
But dealing with the changes, what was what what we
also learned was just how massively important our guys getting
to know each other and love each other and trying.
You know, as a basketball player, you're the only reason
you're here is because you're completely obsessed with your own
(09:54):
personal development and growth. You can't get to Kentucky without
being like crazy, selfishly obsessed with yourself and how you grow,
because that's what it demands. Like this personal sacrifice scat
is so huge, and so we're not living in laala
land where guys are gonna completely divorce themselves from their
own ambitions. But what we're trying to do is build
(10:15):
a place where you're gonna go achieve your own ambitions
by by by becoming the greatest teammate ever and loving
your guys more than you can possibly imagine, because this
actually is by definition here and in the NBA, it
is a team sport and it's about a team. And
I thought that was what helped you know, our guys
(10:38):
being so good at doing that last year was what
helped us survive all the stuff that that kind of
went into the season.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
All right, some basketball nerd stuff a little bit. You
you were very big on that. Fans wondered about the
first substitution substitution pattern. They had a lot of games
where we go out, we get a lead, then you'd
make a sub and people, ah, what's he doing? What's
your philosophy on that on that early in the first
and second half bringing in some subs? What why do
(11:06):
you do that? Well?
Speaker 2 (11:08):
In the games where I brought in substitutions and it
went bad, it was just bad substitution, right. But sometimes
you know, when you're thinking about the whole nature of
the game, you you you so these are thoughts that
go into it, and it's it's pretty much artistic. You
lose the science of it really quick because there's such
a small sample size. But but it's it's you know,
(11:29):
a couple a couple of things going so, uh, when
we thought about our roster alignment, about guys that actually
function well together, or who we could have on the court,
who we felt you know, sometimes there's there's a young
guy that you're trying to put on the court where
you need to have them kind of protected, right, and
so sometimes it's hard to take a bunch of young
(11:49):
guys or less experienced guys and put them on the
court at the same time, and so sometimes you have
to grab someone out of the line up early to
get someone in so that you can start the rotation
early so you don't have a bunch of guys fatiguing
all at the same time, and then you're then you're
doing more wholesale or maybe a guy when he's fresh,
he's actually to be able to be more supportive than
when he s are. So you think about things like that.
You think about running through the roster to kind of
(12:11):
see who's got a good vibe that night, because there's
game to game differentiating. There es game for me you
do I think one hundred percent, and then the other thing,
you're trying to explore his matchups, because the vibe sometime
is really determined by the matchup about like what does
it look like? And sometimes you're thinking, man, I could
really function smaller in this game. Maybe maybe I could
get to smaller in this game against a particular lineup,
(12:35):
and so you're reactive to those things. Sometimes sometimes it's
just a matter of like, hey, I'm going to take
the hit now so I can be more fresh than
the second half, which was really effective for.
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Us this year. You did have a lot of games
where it felt like at the end you guys had
some energy that the other the other team didn't. In
just looking at your roster for next year, and granted
I have not seen these guys play nearly as much
as you have most of them, but it does look
to me as an outside like you intently went to
get more athletic, and it was that? Was that true?
Speaker 2 (13:05):
Yeah? I think I think that we have. Positionally in
some positions, I think we're way more athletic, and I
think positionally in some places were way more physical, And
I think both those things matter.
Speaker 1 (13:16):
Was that a going through the SEC and seeing I
always say about the SEC, especially last year, even the
worst teams in the SEC had great athletes. Was it like, Okay,
I gotta ramp the athleticism up a little bit? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (13:28):
I think it was. It's again, it's always like a
stew of of ideas, right. One of the things that
is functional for us is like positionally if you could,
you know, like a like a low hanging fruit, example
would be just the ability to switch one through four
defensively or one through five defensively. So can you get
(13:48):
more either more size or more quickness or more of
a steal percentage in your back court? And you can
you get you know, a four for example that's more
coultiple or actually could be a dominant defensive figure against
any matchup. Right, So you're kind of thinking about a
bunch of different pieces, Man, can we fit together? And
(14:09):
you're not gonna have your whole roster be able to
do that, but can we put together a lineup where
that's super functional? And how do we add pieces?
Speaker 1 (14:15):
Do that?
Speaker 2 (14:16):
You know, like you do that a thousand different models
of your rosha works together in terms of how you
want to scheme different things on the floor, as well
as just kind of looking individually at ones, two, three,
source fives and the standalone about how they function.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
So I see, again as an outsider with your system
that to me watching your one, the two positions that
seem like to me are the most important for you
are the point guard in the big, especially the big
that's at the top with amar a maris a very
unique ability. So you have I assume Brandon Garrison is
what you're thinking at that role. He had some great moments,
(14:53):
also had some inconsistent moments. I remember when you all
lost him, you saying something to him like all right,
this obvio and you know, here you go. You think
Brandon's ready to take that step up because it'll be
big shoes to fill with the mark.
Speaker 2 (15:06):
Yeah. Well, first, you know, traditionally in my roster, probably
for most of my you know, most of my tenure
as a head coach, it's probably been the four that's
been a more unique piece. We slid into this five
roll kind of of necessity last year and and to
(15:29):
be a personnel group I had before I got to
get that kind of led me to the five a
little bit. It kind of changes, but a lot of
time it's been a four where I'm playing a four
that's an elite level ball handler, decision maker where where
it gives us some space and we can protect a
five a little bit. So those two pieces are interchangeable.
All of that leading to Brandon Garrison. So Brandon Garrison
(15:52):
showed me some signs in the last month and certainly
this summer where he is just like he is growing
up man, And it's so cool to see. It's the
best thing to see as a coach. But uh, he's
talking about what he wants to be. It's no longer
kind of what he is and who he is and
how he expect it's what he wants to become. You know,
(16:12):
he's he's he's done this publicly where he's talked about Amar,
that he was that that beg was blessed to have
this big brother Amary, that the kind of mentored him
and took care of him. Yeah, and that he kind
of wants to be that guy. And it's a change
now when you start to have guys talk about what
they would like to become, then you're like, oh, we
(16:35):
got something here, and he's definitely there.
Speaker 1 (16:36):
Man.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
So much of his space is that and we need
him to be great. Next Year's can be really important
because he's he's one of the few guys that are
coming back with a ton of experience and he's going
to teach everybody on the roster.
Speaker 1 (16:47):
Jalen Lowe I watched play a couple of times. Uh.
I watched him a lot when they played Louisville and
I remember thinking, boy, this guy's got some talent. He's
got some scoot. He can get by people, which something
I thought sometimes we had a hard time doing last year,
beating people off the dribble. He's also though he can
be all over the place. How do you take that talent,
(17:09):
which is immns and then make it work in a
system like yours?
Speaker 2 (17:12):
So super fun stand on him and you've probably seen this,
but so and it's I still haven't found the right
way to say this in short words. To give me
a minute here. So, Jalen Lowe was an elite levels
in terms of the raw stats, points, assist, everything else
he did in the game was really good. But he
wasn't a super efficient player last year. Yeah, part of
(17:33):
it was because he had to do a lot. It's
not a It's no takeaway from Pitt. Pitt's a great
program to do a great job was just a situation
that he was in. And so so one of the
things he did, he was in the ninetieth percentile in
the country, in the top ten percent of taking the
highest percentage of shots that were are in the bottom
(17:55):
twenty percent of shot quality. Oh that's a that's a
long analytical way of saying he took he made the
game so hard, or the game that was delivered him
was so harder. However, that happened like he was taking
some of them trying to make the hardest plays in
the game of basketball and make him over and over
and over again. Not incredibly dissimilar in some ways from
(18:17):
Lamont Butler. So Lamont Butler shot quality usage wasn't quite
a low shot bottom twenty percent. Shot quality usage wasn't
quite as significant when he came, but it was still
a little bit of that trend. He had never been
forty eight percent from two, he'd never been really above
thirty three percent from three. He comes here, he shoots
thirty nine point one percent from three on the season,
(18:38):
suffering half the season with a debilitating shoulder injury, and
was at fifty six percent from two at eight percentage
point jump in a super senior. And so much of
that was because he was humble enough and willing enough to, like,
let me rethink this game a little bit, so I
don't spend all my time trying to get better at
making impossible shots, but I actually manipulate this game and
(19:01):
work enough to earn myself great stuff. So now instead
of being instead of being in the top ten percent
of taking of usage of bottom twenty percent quality shots,
now I mean like the top ten percent of usage
of like twenty to eighty percent quality shots, right, And
that shift without improving your raw skill set can transform
(19:24):
your entire game. And so what we love is I
love seeing guys where I'm like, wow, with a little
bit of study and a little bit of humility and curiosity, like,
we can transform your So that's a really interesting crazy
because I was gonna ask you, that's a moneyball game.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
When the season is over, you have this porridge of
players to choose from. They're all over the place, and
you could choose, especially at Kentucky, you could choose a
lot of them. You got a lot of choices. How
do you sit there and say Cam Williams at Tulane
that's the kid I want? Like, how do you even
how do you come to the point of saying that?
(20:02):
Are you looking for things like that? Little inefficiencies you
can take advantage?
Speaker 2 (20:05):
Yes, Like, so you're always ask yourself what are you
good at coaching? Like what part of coaching are you
good at? Right? And it changes, So it changes based
on a guy's talent and based on it, but like
it's a it's a it's very much all sliding scales,
like you have one hundred sliding scales. But you're kind
of like, okay, this is this is what happened out
Jayalen Lowe had a terrific season last year, I mean
(20:28):
put up really incredible numbers. So that's that was the
number one reason why I came out on the radar.
But as you dig deeper into it, you're like, ooh,
you know what, like we could actually take credit for
him getting way better when it's really not. It's really
not that complicend. And and when you when you think
about Cam, I mean Cam was pretty easy for us.
(20:48):
I think about that three kind of four spot guy
that can really shoot it, really stretch the floor.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
But when you say it's easy for you, like I
remember when he committed, I had somebody close to you today,
here's the case for him, here's why he's awesome. But
if I hadn't talked to that person, I would have
seen the stats and gone, that's odd to me. So
how is it comes to you.
Speaker 2 (21:08):
To Well, it's it's a little bit like so because
we know what fits in our system. We know what works.
You know. To me, it's just to give you like
it was, you know, and things don't always work out
the way that you think they're going to, right. But
when we signed Ansley Almanor, there was a lot of
(21:28):
kind of questions and I was just like, ah, guys,
just wait, just wait and see. And now I didn't
I wasn't saying that he was gonna have the greatest
shooting season in the history of Kentucky basketball. That's not.
But what I was saying is like, no, you don't
understand the way he fits into our system. The way
we played was is very much an NBA style, Like
we've had players like him that come in here and
(21:49):
they are winning you games and you didn't anticipate it
because of the skill set he brings because it's a
piece that fits so well to what we do.
Speaker 1 (21:59):
I had learn about him because to Mario and now
we're at your pro deck. Yeah, and I like, I
give him a hard time about it because he was
I was like, I looked at Antsy Almanor, I'm guilty
of this and I went, I don't know about that dude,
Like I trust smart, but I don't know and I
and I used to joke, hey, Mario, this is your
favorite player, and then I saw it once the game starting,
(22:21):
I saw what you were. So that's what you're looking
for our pieces.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
And and and listen, this is Cam Williams.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
Now is he's an NBA.
Speaker 2 (22:28):
Yeah, he's the NBA piece, Like he's the NBA loves him.
So it's not like we have some genius insight into
like reading these guys, but like we I think we
have a pretty clear sense of how we'd like to
do things and how we like to function, and then
finding the guys that that suit that really well. And
Cam is one of these guys that he's gonna be
(22:49):
great wherever he goes and plays, but coming here where
we're really really gonna dig in and use the skills,
he's gonna be special. So it's all different.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
But so how do you find the dude from Croatia?
I mean, you know he played for by the way
he played the team. I don't you probably know this
when when Kentucky played in the Bahamas that we played
them and beat him by like night we played that team.
How did you end up with him?
Speaker 2 (23:11):
In fact, I'm gonna throw meets go under the bus.
So Misco is one of the top agents in all
of all of Europe, and so Misko, uh, you know,
had kind of been a party to setting up that game.
And then I guess when they got to the game,
there were a bunch of stipulations like you guys aren't
allowed to play so and so is so.
Speaker 1 (23:32):
He's not allowed to play zone.
Speaker 2 (23:34):
He's still bitter about losing by fifty of that game.
Speaker 1 (23:37):
Uh but we I remember they not allowed to play zone. No. Yeah,
but but I mean you look and you go now
that we follow this guy, like, wow, how did you hit?
You got on your radar?
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Yeah, so you know, our staff does an unbelievable job
scouring everywhere and and and he's the guy that kind
of you know when you So he's in a developmental team,
megas a development mental team, So they play in a
professional league, but they're all developmental guys. So they bring
in really young guys and just raise them up playing
them against legitimate guys. And his length was super attractive
(24:11):
to us once we got on film, and his skill set,
his ability to push the ball in transition and kind
of make a decision on the floor, and then talking
to him was was really great. So you know, one
of the interesting things is we go through this portal
season is we talk to everybody. And the reason we
talk to everybody is because we actually don't know who
fits Kentucky. So we actually have to have multiple conversations
(24:33):
not just with the player, but with the team around
them to understand if they fit here. There's so many
guys that don't fit Kentucky this place.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Is do you sometimes have to go meet them to know.
Speaker 2 (24:45):
That sometimes, but we don't always have that. You know,
I'm a FaceTime zoom guy, so I want to be
even with that.
Speaker 1 (24:51):
Though. Have you had meetings where you had the FaceTime
and went, yeah, I just don't think.
Speaker 2 (24:55):
This work for one hundred percent. Yes, So that happens.
This is a special so special place. So it happens
more often than not that that we're a little bit
in and we're like, ah, like, you know, I might
love his time and be like, oh, he's not gonna
survive here, or I might I might love you know
him as a kid, but think, ah, his agenda is
(25:16):
just different than our agenda. And so you know, that
process is really important, and that was one of the
one of the really important parts of the process with
Andrea because I liked him. You know, you never know,
like we'll see how some of the skills that translates,
some of the physicality translates, some of some of those
things translate. But as we were exploring all those things,
(25:38):
which I was so excited about, all those pieces, when
I started talking about on the phone and like it
was one particular conversation on FaceTime where I'm talking to
him and you could see him get emotional as he
started to talk about the possibility of playing at the
University of Kentucky, and I'm like, that's it. That's our guy, right,
because he's gonna get it. He's not gonna miss it.
(25:59):
As the head coach here running this program, I cannot
bring guys in here that are gonna miss this. It
would feel like I'm disrespecting this place that I love
so much. And sometimes like uber talented guys could come
here and miss this. But I think the guys are
gonna serve us well as a community and a commonwealth.
And is is that this this this incredible? You know,
(26:21):
the pro the flagship program all college basketball, or the
guys that have come here and not miss it, and
those are the guys who actually hang banners forks.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
You know, you having played here, you know what it
means to people to have dudes from Kentucky. And you
are going to have three on this year's team, which
has gotta be one of the most. Ryan sitting over there,
I mean, there are not many times we've had more
than three.
Speaker 2 (26:43):
I'm so, I'm so proud of Ryan for having his
shirt on. Still this is I'm really proud of you. Man.
That's actually super cool.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
A few minutes, but you from last year's team, you
had Trent Noah, you had Travis Parry. Trent's coming back.
Everybody's excited when the when the Travis thing doesn't work
out and he ends up going what is your like,
how's that play out? Because you know what dudes from
Kentucky mean to the fan base.
Speaker 2 (27:07):
I know, so this is the thing, so you know,
a bunch of things can be true at the same time.
Travis Travis Perry is special, special, special like he had
just is and he's a big time basketball player and
he's gonna have a big time career. He's gonna be
a terrific player and he's such a joy to coach.
I mean, he just you know, took an information and
(27:30):
just wanted to get better. And and he's got this
seriousness about him that's pretty unflappable. And I just think
he's got so many of the components of being a
great basketball player. So and and I love coaching him,
and that's all true. And so sometimes I get cautious
about when he told me that he was leaving. We
actually were having an ongoing conversation. I was trying to
(27:50):
like help him see what I saw, and you know,
we just just didn't get to the same place. I
was super It was devastating. I mean, it's actually like
it hurts my soul now just because.
Speaker 1 (28:04):
I so you really tried to convince him.
Speaker 2 (28:08):
Oh man, I just desperately want him to stay and
and and and and Travis Perry loves Kentucky. So that
that's when I say, I want to be sensitive, like
he loves Kentucky. It's just he just you know, I
would never want to put words his mouth, but I
think probably he was just not feeling super confident about
the path for him here at Kentucky being exactly what
(28:29):
he wanted out of the game of basketball. Maybe I
couldn't have disagreed with him more on that. But you know,
at the end of the day, we're all just making
our best. Guess. I just know and so and and listen,
he's gonna go to Ole miss and he's gonna have
a great career there, and he's gonna do it he's there,
and yeah, he's a terrific player and and and all
(28:51):
those things are true. I just know that being a
Kentucky basketball player is so much bigger than being a
basketball player. And and it's my job to help our
guys see that and understand it and and feel it
and and and and you know it sometimes as old people,
(29:15):
it's so much easier for us to see ten years
and twenty and thirty years down the road than it's
just for young guys. And and so there's no so
it just it just just all of that just man,
it just it breaks my heart. But I'm also I
love I love Travis and and he's gonna have a
great run and all those things are all true.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
At the same time, I'm gonna read you what Ryan
Lemon just texted me. All right, So now I got
to give you the part where we give you a
hard time. We have a little thing on the show
where we talk about how much you say special and
how much you say beautiful. Man and Ryan just said
Pope throughout the trifecta special. Travis Perry is special, special, special.
You love those words beautiful and special.
Speaker 2 (29:57):
Don't don't be don't be mad at me. I'm not
mad at you because Leanne crushes me. She's like, well,
you stop saying beautiful. At one point I was saying breathtaking.
She's like, stop saying you say. She's like, could you
please grow your lexicon so you can have some other
works of sayers special and beautiful and.
Speaker 1 (30:15):
Beautiful is a big one. You're big. I'm beautiful.
Speaker 2 (30:17):
I'm actually gonna I'm actually gonna put a card down
here with some some some synonyms for for for my hyperbology.
Speaker 1 (30:24):
You know, some people have a cuss jar. You need
to have a beautiful and special jar, so they have
to put a dollar in uh every time. Let me
ask you some philosophy things about things I know Kentucky
fans care. Well, let's talk about scheduling real quick. You
have made and we don't even know all the schedule yet,
but like it's gonna be a hard schedule here. I mean,
you know, when you we start the Indiana series back,
(30:44):
we got the Saint John's game where they're replacing in
the Champions Classic, there'll be an ACC team come here.
I'm rooting for Duke, although I hear it's gonna be
something else, which disappoints me, but that's not your control.
And now you got these two preseason games perdue and
today was announced Georgetown. You really believe in Let's go
play the best, right? I mean?
Speaker 2 (31:04):
This is this? Yeah, you guys are hear me say this,
until as long as I get to be here. You know,
if you're coming to Kentucky, you don't come here and hide.
It doesn't make sense to come here and hide. Like
we're gonna grow. We have some by games where we're
gonna have a chance to grow and and do whatever.
But like this is you know, if you'll let me.
(31:24):
I spent the entire weekend and then I'm going to
the SEC meetings next week and all I can talk
about is we got to expand this over thirty one games.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
I agree, like we have got to.
Speaker 2 (31:33):
Expand this season, guys, because what's happening is especially with
the revenue share. Now, like the revenue share should change
everything in terms of our opportunity to actually go share revenue. Right,
let's get to you know, I keep saying forty and
everyone's mad at me. I'm gonna keep pushing forty. But
can we get to thirty five? Imagine if we had
(31:54):
four extra games? Yea, then we can put on our
schedule where we go play a big time neutral game
and set up a home and home and and and
do an in state game that people here really care about,
and just give us a little more flexibility in this deal.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
I just think, well, what's the downside? I mean I
used to say, like, well, you don't want to have
games during Christmas break? But who cares? Now? I mean
at this point, like why not?
Speaker 2 (32:20):
But this is the thing is those are the greatest games.
And listen, if you know every kid is inspiring and
go play in the league. Yeah, one year from now,
they're gonna be playing a Christmas Day game and their
whole family's gonna come. You know, with nil, Now you
fly your family in for the Christmas Day game. You
want to be a pro, let's be a pro. Right,
(32:40):
And I even if you keep a three day window
right now they have this three day window, It's fine.
You know, people argue about that. People, you don't have
to make the season longer. Give us an extra week
in the season, that's fine.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
But to simper you all play, it's like once a
week a lot of times, right.
Speaker 2 (32:55):
And we have six weeks of practice leading up to it. Anyway, Yeah,
extend out a little, just to double down on this
whole on this whole insanity. You know, we'll get our
guys in the summer, and our guys every college basketball
player is making more probably than their parents right now. Okay,
And the incredible thing is that during the summer, these
(33:18):
guys are getting paid a significant amount of money and
they're only allowed to work four hours a week, and
the guys are dying. They're like, can we please, you know,
can we please get together and get some work done?
Like the all the whole thing is starting ouside it
but I'm getting.
Speaker 1 (33:35):
Them, know, actually think that it makes perfect sense.
Speaker 2 (33:38):
So all of that leads me back to, like, can
we please extend this season because you know what, we
get Purdue and Georgetown, which is awesome in the non conference,
but come on, man, let us do a home a
home with Kansas, Like yes, So, like, why am I
not going to stores to play a game, like we
should be up.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Some more.
Speaker 2 (33:58):
We need some more flexibility this and also like we
have to like let us get to Maui.
Speaker 1 (34:04):
Now.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Part of the complication is is that we make so
much revenue off our home games that I'm locked into
this twenty game home slate. We have to do that
to pay the bills for us and for the athletic department,
which is good. That's a good thing. It's fine, it's great.
Bring on some more flexibility so we play some more
games that every school could actually bring in some more
(34:25):
revenue that we can share with these student athletes, that
we can share with the rest of athletic department.
Speaker 1 (34:29):
Let's go, well, they have some of those tournaments now
where the players get revenue, and I would think that's
probably helpful in recruiting if you can play in them.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
Right, and our guys do better academically. It's the time
tested proven our guys do better academically during the season
than they do out of season. So let's make the
season the whole school year. Our guys will be four
point those students, they're.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
All gonna be academic starts.
Speaker 2 (34:53):
I'm gonna brag about this. Our guys that we were
three point five GPA team nice this year. I'm super
proud of our guys academically. Out to Michael Stone. Does
everybody it'd be another A lot of people do. Yeah,
Michael Stone is a legend. If you take your mom
and you multiplier by ten, that is Michael Stone. He
is relentless. I mean this guy, he is the greatest
(35:17):
to ever do this job.
Speaker 1 (35:18):
Man.
Speaker 2 (35:18):
I love him.
Speaker 1 (35:19):
So. The only downside I've seen about your tenure is
and I hear this from Louisville fans too, so like
I loved at times how much Kentucky and Louisville hated
each other, Cal and your old coach wanted to stab
each other and still do whether whether they say it
or not. But you and Pat Kelsey are too nice.
Like the Louisville fans don't hate you. We don't really
(35:41):
hate Pat Kelsey. That's the only thing I got to
get you to spice up the Louisville rivalry a little bit.
Speaker 2 (35:46):
I hate this Pat Kelsey and all of those Louisville fans.
Speaker 1 (35:52):
Hay, No, now here's the thing.
Speaker 2 (35:54):
I'm gonna tell you this. You know it's actually super cool?
Speaker 1 (35:56):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (35:57):
Is that I got a boatload respect for Pat Helle. Okay,
I got so much. I think he's what he's what
he did last year was incredible. Yes, And I mean
two of my guys played for him last year, right,
and and what they accomplished and and you know, I
don't I don't have a ton of interaction with the
little fanibies, but I'm sure they're great. But but here's
the thing. I actually the one thing I would say
(36:19):
is that that I actually think I think that this
that this Kentucky Louislle thing is just gonna get heated
and heated. You know, it's gonna get heated because it's
gonna be back to being like one verse four in
the contret.
Speaker 1 (36:32):
No, they're gonna be good and they and they have
the nisle to participate, and I think that's gonna be Yes. Yeah,
well you get you get to go in there next year.
You'll get a sense of I think they're gonna be
cussing at you like they used to cuss me.
Speaker 2 (36:44):
They would never, they would not do that.
Speaker 1 (36:50):
I've had some blank Matt Jones chance from the student section,
so I think, uh, maybe you'll get that as well. Okay,
So going into year two, you made a that was
like we want to be the best in everything, and
you basically said and then included we're gonna be the
We're gonna pay the most, We're gonna do this, We're
gonna do that. I thought that was a really interesting statement.
A lot of coaches want to downplay the future and
(37:12):
kind of go we want you're you're just embracing like
we're gonna be the top and we're gonna have to
do that.
Speaker 2 (37:18):
It's Kentucky, Like, you know what, Guys like, I'm not
gonna be the guy that comes to Kentucky as the
head coach and somehow lowers the expectations of this place. Man,
we're trying to win this whole thing. Like we failed
at our job last year. You know you believe that
one hundred percent. Like we listen. If I know myself,
for the last thirty years, I've been a diehard Kentucky fan.
(37:40):
If we didn't went out, Like what is wrong with
that coach? Man? He can't win to Kentucky. That's what
all my guys are saying to me every single day.
And so like I'm not unrealistic. I understand the reality.
But we're supposed to listen, we are blessed. I'll tell
you the one thing that nobody in the world will deny. Okay,
you can't actually argue we have the great fan base
(38:01):
in all of college basketball. There's no one any other
fan base that would argue that. Nobody can argue that.
And so that fan base deserves the best of everything.
And so you go down the list, and we're trying
to be the best at everything. And that's what Kentucky
is supposed to be. That's what Kentucky has traditionally been.
Speaker 1 (38:19):
That's what you know.
Speaker 2 (38:20):
I was just with I was just with Karl Anthony
Towns yesterday in New York. And that's what he expects
out of this joint and and and that's what Antons
cars yesterday. Yeah, I mean it's what that's what all
our foreigner players, former coaches, you know what you know,
that's what Cal expects. I mean, Cal is that Arcis.
He's like, don't you ruin my program?
Speaker 1 (38:39):
Man?
Speaker 2 (38:39):
That's the best song I wanted to all of basketball.
Speaker 1 (38:41):
I wondered when you got here? Here was here was
a worry I had not about you as a coach.
But you know, Kentucky fans, I think we're ready for
a different thing. But they do love that. We have
twenty six guys in the NBA and they love those
guys and they watch them. They still feel very connected.
And there was a part of me that goes, well,
those guys still, you'll embrace this new coach, this new era.
(39:02):
And then I saw Andrew Harrison, who's not in the pros,
but said he watched more UK games this year than
he had in years past. And I've seen you, you know, talking,
and Devin Booker gave you a compliment and all these
was that important to you to keep that bond with
all those NBA guys and all those guys that played
for Cal.
Speaker 2 (39:20):
Well, it's listen. I mean guys played for Cal and
they played for Tubby and played for Jobie and and
and so those relationship Listen. You develop a really special
relationship with your head coach, like every player does. That
should never go away. Like I mean, I played for
coach Patino. Coach Patino is is is is coaching at
(39:41):
Saint John's. I'm not gonna wear Saint John's T shirt,
but but I love Coach Patino. I say that from
the rooftops. I'll shot it from the rooftops, if you know,
I was out a little quieter when he was coaching
at Louisville, but otherwise, like so that relationship is always
gonna exist. But but here's the thing, just like we
were talking about with TP right, I am thirty years
(40:03):
down the road, and I know what it feels like
to walk back into Rupp Arena with your family and
to let your children see this place that changed the
trajectory of your life forever, and it means something. It
was actually super you know, I don't know if Carls
gonna get mad at me, but I was with him
yesterday and he talked that's what he talked about. He's
(40:26):
actually so forward thinking that he's already thinking about legacy.
And so he was talking about one day when he
brings his children back to Kentucky and that they get
to see because the truth is that we all stop
playing and then the next guy's become way cooler to
our kids. Yeah, and then you get to walk back
into the gym and you get to see this relationship
(40:49):
that our thirty year old, you know, thirty years ago
played and played in Kentucky, Jersey. You still feel see
how people embrace them and you get to walk in
with your children and they get to feel that and
they get to see you on a light that they
never actually saw you cool. And that's a real thing.
Speaker 1 (41:08):
And I know that.
Speaker 2 (41:09):
I mean, I got to play in the league as
a bad player for a long time. I know what
it's like. And so I want every single coach, every
single one, and every single player that ever played here
to feel like this is their building because they built it,
like we get to enjoy it right now. I get
to be the head coach at Kentucky enjoying this because
(41:30):
of what Kat and what Antoine and what Tony and
what Kyle Macy and what Joby, what all those guys built.
That's what I get to enjoy right now. And so
it's really important to me that every single person that
ever wore this jersey or walked the East sidelines always
feels like this is home, because that's what BBN does.
That's how BBN is.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
Man.
Speaker 2 (41:51):
There's no fan base like it. You know, you finished,
you put on this jersey, and thirty years from now,
whether you were the best player on the team or
you're coming off the bench for two seconds at the
end of the last game of the conference season, they
will remember you and cherish you because you shared an
experience together.
Speaker 1 (42:09):
Yeah, John Wall, who It's crazy to me, but it
almost gets me emotional to hear John Wall talk about
how excited he is about you. Like, that's a great
sort of melding of time. Dev's giving me the look.
So I got one more question. So let me do
this quickly. You went to London on Sunday. You saw
that devastation down there, which I also saw on Saturday,
(42:30):
and then we took the show on Monday. It is
very hard to describe pictures in video. Don't do it justice.
You were there. I know that had to have had
an effect on you.
Speaker 2 (42:41):
Yeah, it's so I mean, man, I had so many
you know, I was only there for six hours. On Saturday,
I was in Omaha and Memphis recruiting, and I called
I heard heard about reports, and so I called Shep
and I was just like, you know what what you know?
And everything's happened in real time on the ground. So
(43:03):
she was like, I don't know, man, We're still racing
around trying to find out what's what and who's who
and how we can help and who needs help? And
so he texted me. I got back late that ninety
he text me and said, Hey, there's a place where
I'm going to go tomorrow with a few people, and
we're just going to try and actually just try and
help one house, right, to help one family. And so
(43:25):
he gave me an address and we actually we actually
got there early that morning. I took a couple of
daughters and then a couple of their friends and we
ended up parking a few hours away because there was
so much stuff, and we got out of the car
and we actually never made it to the house we
were supposed to go to because we got out of
the car. And I'm gonna just say that first days,
but a senior couple maybe or late seventies, early eighties,
(43:49):
Catherine and Jerry, were outside their house. There was a
bunch of trees that had fallen on their roof, a
huge trailer that I think had blown from the airport
and flipped over right pushed against the side of ours.
It was just absolute chaos, and they were outside kind
of like trying to pick up stuff, and so we
just stopped right there and we just started helping them.
(44:09):
And then he grabbed a little chainsaw and he started
cutting off a little branches these trees. We started taking
it down and then you know what was really miraculous.
Just to give you all emphasized the hopeful side of
this was it seemed like every half an hour, a
new group a couple people showed up. And by the
time we finished, you know, six hours later, we removed
(44:31):
all these trees from off their house. We had probably
four chains. I was working. The big guns came in
and we had a big h you know kind of
uh forklift that came in. It was helping to lift
trees and and uh. And there was a family that
was really special to me from Paduca that that had
just they had just come and parked and walked into
(44:52):
the front yard after us, and I was like, do
you guys know the family where He was like, no,
we were in Paduca when things were really tough four
or five years. People came helped us. So when we
heard about we got in the car and we drove
out here and we're like we're gonna like, we're gonna
go pay it, pay it, pay it forward right kind
of thing. And he was just like and then when
we we when we left, we're trying to drive out
(45:14):
and I kid you not. There was a like a
it was a it was a parking lot for like
a mile with people coming into town. And we drove
by a gas station. There's two people out there with
signs that are like they just had science scribbled the
magic mark er free food. So you know, you just
inviting people to come stop buying and if they if
(45:35):
they need some food. And the point is like, there's
so much work to be done, and it's like, you know,
all of us that go in the you know, like
we went in the first day, and so that's all great,
but they're gonna be fighting us for the next years, right,
and so the continuity of help and care for this
community really is really important. But it was I'm telling you,
it's it's Kentucky. It's Kentucky, man, the same vibe that
(45:58):
we have in BBN, where there's this it's just this
connection point like people in the state. From my vantage point,
like we are great at loving our neighbor like people
love their neighbors man. And that's to me, that's a
gospel principle that's so important. But it's something that we
see lived out in the lives of people here and
and Kentucky's had way more than his fair share of
(46:20):
natural disaster over the last couple of years. But it
was as Biancy and I saw you guys down there,
and I and and uh, you know what, I'll give
you a little sid of hair because I think it's
so cool. So you know, I know you guys, I
think you were on air live there. But I saw
some social media stories that you guys did where people
were telling their story and I want to expand this
(46:41):
just as this connection point. So I had some guys
coming to my office like a month ago. I haven't
had a chance to tell you this, and they this gentleman,
incredible artist, just an amateur artists. He got a real job,
but he's just he's just and so he did this
incredible painting from the from the press conference a year ago,
and he brought the office and this was what was
(47:02):
super cool. So it was him and he brought his
four buddies and there but my age there fifty right,
and and and kind of gave me this gift. So
we're sitting down talking in the office and so we
got to this point where they're like, ah, man, we
just you know, when I get up in the morning.
The first thing I do is be like, what's you know,
what's going on new? And then then I'm listening to KSR,
you know, while I'm working, and then you know, I
(47:24):
get home and after dinner, I'll go check and see,
you know, what else is happened with the cats and
the whole thing. And it's this connection point, the same
thing we're talking about that you guys do an incredible
job providing is is. And I say this all the time.
It's like, it doesn't really matter if you say something
bad about me or good about me, or bad about
(47:44):
the cats or good about the cats. What matters is
that there's all these people coming to the well. So
I got to I've been. I had a chance to
go to Africa so many times and do some service
trips there and in these communities though, well, in these villages,
the well is where you always find people because everybody
(48:05):
is constantly throughout the day. You have to go, you
have to leave your hut and you walk across the
village and you go to the well to collect waters
happening all throughout the day. And so the well is
a special place because it's where everybody gathers and everybody interacts,
and you guys do an unbelievable job. And I thought
it was so special that you guys went down there
and and just like brought the well there too where
(48:27):
everybody can see. That's super cool, man. I appreciate you
doing that. Well.
Speaker 1 (48:30):
I want to thank you. I'll let you go, but
I want to say this set with you a year ago,
and I told you that before you had gotten hired.
I was kind of like, you know what, I might
be done with this, and you said to me, And
at that point I decided to stay. But you said
to me, you begged me to do I was I
was like, you don't have to beg me. I'm going
to do it. But you have. This is the fan
(48:54):
Matt talking, not the radio host. You have rejuvenated the
love of this People always loved the basketball, people always
wanted to win all that, but you have rejuvenated the
thing where there's a pride, there's a self esteem that
comes with being a part of it, and there's that collectiveness.
In a state that's had a lot of difficulties historically,
(49:16):
but especially in the last few years, this is that
center point. And I've watched people who had kind of
gone you know, I don't know if college sports are
for me anymore. And you brought all that back, and
these those players brought that back, and that is a
really special thing. So just as somebody who talks to
the fan base, thank you for that, because there's a
(49:38):
lot of people who said to me, last year was
one of my favorite years being a Kentucky fan. And
I think we'll look back at last year the way
we look back at some of those early Rick teams,
the John Waldon, Marcus Cousins cal team, like the you
got everybody back, and I think that's awesome.
Speaker 2 (49:55):
So let's say let's run back this year. I think
I think we got a chance.
Speaker 1 (49:58):
Man.
Speaker 2 (49:58):
I think I think we're gonna fall and love with
this team. And I think these guys, you know, the
the the DNA of this team. By definition, we have
a crew of guys that are like hungry to compete.
We don't have anybody that's running away from it. Like
everybody that's on this roster is hungry to come compete.
I think they all get Kentucky and they're excited embrace it.
(50:20):
I think there's gonna be a fun ride, man. I
can't wait.
Speaker 1 (50:22):
Take it with your appreciate.
Speaker 2 (50:24):
Okay, let's go.
Host
Matt Jones
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If you eat, sleep, and breathe true crime, TRUE CRIME TONIGHT is serving up your nightly fix. Five nights a week, KT STUDIOS & iHEART RADIO invite listeners to pull up a seat for an unfiltered look at the biggest cases making headlines, celebrity scandals, and the trials everyone is watching. With a mix of expert analysis, hot takes, and listener call-ins, TRUE CRIME TONIGHT goes beyond the headlines to uncover the twists, turns, and unanswered questions that keep us all obsessed—because, at TRUE CRIME TONIGHT, there’s a seat for everyone. Whether breaking down crime scene forensics, scrutinizing serial killers, or debating the most binge-worthy true crime docs, True Crime Tonight is the fresh, fast-paced, and slightly addictive home for true crime lovers.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.