Radical changes needed for UK's Basketball Program
- Thread starter catswin_9
- Start date
This post was not intended to knock this team and their chances. It was focused on looking at the big picture for the BB program.
He's also been a head coach for almost 40 years. I would hope he's won something at this point. He surely didn't win anything his last 5 or so years at UK.
Pope has been a head coach for almost 15 years. He has 0 championships of any kind. No NCAA or conference tourney, or even regular season titles.
Cool story. Lets go back and hang some banners in Rupp for all of Cal's #1 recruiting classes, and preseason #1 ranking in the polls. Since that's so important. That was the entire point of this thread. PRESEASON RANKINGS.
It's a little different. With Calipari you could always expect a solid 20-25 wins. Because he had a sample size, that showed that. His last season here, he would have those type of regular seasons, but flame out in the tourney. When it started becoming a pattern, of losing early in the NCAAT and SECT, he bailed. With Pope, we can infer, it's most likely going to be another 11 or 12 loss season, with no SEC or NCAA hardware. His career here, at BYU, and Utah Valley, shows that.
People, Mark Pope is not a young, unproven, head coach. Every great coach has had success somewhere. Hurley was elite as a HS coach, Calipari made final fours at doormats, Coach K got Army to the NIT, Knight took Army to the NIT 4 times. Pope couldn't get BYU any conference titles. Never made the NCAAT as even a 15-16 seed at Utah Valley.
Cal was running on early 2010's momentum. It finally petered out in the 2020's. He exploited a market inefficiency, perception of freshman ability, but then everybody caught up and Duke got even better at it than him. I also believe Cal lost a bit of coaching edge. He just couldn't get his teams to defend like they did in the early 2010's anymore.
Your sentiment is understood, but Pope did make the tournament in 2 out of the 4 opportunities he had a BYU. There was no tournament in 2020, which ironically, was probably his best team at BYU. In the mythical 2020 tournament, we might have been destined to play against them in a 4/5 seed matchup.
Club Blue made this happen, led by Jacob Tamme.
And Mitch did not want to retire, he was ‘encouraged’ to, if that’s the word you want to use. His hiring privileges were taken away as it was obvious to anyone paying attention that we were behind the times in both major sports and it was time for a change.
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And it took a miracle to avoid having a first round loss for the 3rd out of 4 ncaa appearances.
Im just hoping we can lose the ncaa game by single digits this season when we lose.
Pope went further with the best players injured . Bravo
Don’t you remember Mitch saying he was taking a committee approach versus just him being involved? That was not his doing. The BOT knew it was time for a change at AD and they were not gonna let Mitch botch another hire with an insane contract to handcuff the school anymore.
And yet people desperately try to force the rest of us into accepting the results because they’re “better than Cal!”
There is no real evidence it ever happened. It's just something they choose to believe because it matches their feelings.
and again...when compared to the standard that at least once was kentucky basketball.....that is not good enough.
It's comparing it to what the situation was when he took over with an empty roster. He also has dealt with extreme injury issues that would be a challenge for any coach to overcome. Have fun with your response Dandy Andy Dudah as your new 33 minute old account is now on ignore.
If Cal could be counted on to win 20-25, wouldn’t that also mean he probably has 10+ losses?
Pope has been here 2 seasons. He inherited an empty roster and has been crushed by injuries. He has also faced the two most difficult schedules in UK history and has still met your 20-25 win plateau.
Citing HS accomplishments and NIT's is laughable.
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Just how many times will you attempt this stupid exaggeration when you have been corrected numerous times? He has been a head coach 11 seasons. In no world would almost 15 seasons be an appropriate claim.
"big" needs to be defined. so do the consequences for not meeting those goals.
Pope coached at 2 other schools before UK, shill. Laughable how? The NIT wasn't a slouch in the 60s when Knight was there or the 70s with K. It was on par with the NCAA.
I for one don't have much confidence in Zoom at PG. He hasn't proven himself to be a winner at the collegiate level. If he can stop over dribbling, utilize his physicality, and shoot efficiently then maybe he'll surprise me but I have serious reservations.
This makes zero sense. 11 is not almost 15 and I'm not a boomer nor would it matter in any way if I was.
No it wouldn't matter, it's just that most ardent Pope defenders are in their generation.
You are making an absolute clown of yourself claiming the NIT was the same as the NCAA in the 60's and 70's. Do you consider our 1976 NIT title the same as winning the NCAA?
Then why did we run off Cal for Pope? I would’ve preferred keeping Cal if the results were going to be the same. At least we wouldn’t alienate our former players. It makes no sense.
That's definitely going off topic but I had nothing to do with running off Cal. Pope is trying to clean up the mess of inheriting an empty roster and has had his two seasons severely hampered by injuries and the two most difficult schedules in school history as I said.
Thanks to the transfer portal, everyone starts off with an empty roster. This isn’t unique to Kentucky and Pope. Even Cal at Arkansas had an empty roster when he was first hired.
You have a 1000 excuses for Pope with problems every single college coach has. Nothing about injuries or “schedule difficulty” or roster turnover or any of that nonsense is any different for any other SEC coach.
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