Imagine if we don't win another game this year and Mitch allows him to come back.
That is exactly what will happen if we lose out from here. No doubt.
Its going to be a sad day. I would welcome Pope back if there was significant improvements from last year, but its worse than last year.
That’s exactly what will happen. But this offseason won’t be a fun time for Pope or his family in Lexington, that’s for sure.
I voted no but it could go either way. I do know the players seem like they couldn’t care less. Mark Pope is a smart man but coaching basketball doesn’t appear to be his strong suit. It looks like the players don’t respect Pope or any of his assistants, and playing for the name on the front of the jersey is out the window. I just wish this season would end and none of our rivals win the NC. Sad, sad time to be a UK basketball fan. I’d like for Pope to take it upon himself to leave but that won’t happen either.
Didn’t say they were getting 1 seeds I said they should and it is realistic maybe 3 out of 10 years and the others 2-3 and at worst a 4 seed
They should do one of 3 things
This is probably the right answer. Pope never gets bad enough to get fired but never good enough to excite fans. But he’ll still probably get another 2 seasons to be utterly mediocre while other programs blast past us and we’re never able to catch up again because of this program’s administration’s refusal to hold people making millions of dollars accountable.
Disagree. If he has an average year in year three, he’s fired. Period. Nothing that happens, including losing out, gets him fired this year, but it still matters because each loss means next year has to be even better. He’s, at minimum going to need a strong regular season and Sweet 16 next year to even hang onto the job IMO. For me personally, even that isn’t enough — he needs an Elite Eight and coach better defense. And I like Pope and want it to work. Just being real.
You have far more faith in Mitch Barnhart and/or his, probably handpicked, successor than I do, frankly.
I go with what Matt Jones says on this stuff. When he’s giving you big picture stuff, you may as well listen closely. While we do have big boosters at the school, no one is bigger than the Crafts and Matt is very close friends to them. So when Matt is telling you Pope is in a “prove it or lose it “ year 3, it’s not a random shot in the dark. Mitch won’t even be at the school by the summer, and it would matter anyway. Just like with Stoops who Barnhart didn’t want to part with, the boosters let him know it was time to move on. Those voices matter more than Mitch or Marc Hill on these things.
Same here. I’m pretty dammed sad about it to. What’s a fan to do except watch and cheer for the Cats as hard as we can.
Could anyone quit a job making five plus million dollars for hanging around a gym all day and being a celebrity. I couldn’t, but I certainly understand why you would ask the question. I thought and hoped he would be great here but has been average at best. I’m still holding out hope that this season was a wash with injuries and bad attitudes or some other excuse and he’ll kill it from now on. That hope is getting slimmer by the day though.
What do you mean you like Pope. Do you know him Personally are you meaning from a coaching perspective. I don't know what like has got to do with it. You crap in one hand and hope in the other, see which one fills up first.
Average at best means he for the most part is below average. Why do we want a below average anything here.
I like some of Pope’s positive qualities as a basketball coach. I don’t know Pope at all personally. Don’t know what to say about that last line, just wow lol.
Sadly, it doesn’t matter if this year was an anomaly with injuries (despite last year also having injuries), if he can’t get anyone in the 2026 class, I have even slimmer hope that he’ll knock it out of the park come portal season.
Ohh I don’t. lol. I want to dominate and give it all out there. I didn’t see the 100% earlier this season for whatever reason.
