BOZICH | While John Calipari carries on, an amazing Kentucky basketball streak primed to end | Sports

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- John Calipari stopped taking the University of Kentucky men's basketball team to the Final Four after 2015 and to the Sweet Sixteen after 2019. He won his only national title in 2012.

That is why Calipari's zip code flipped from 40508 to 72701 last month.

But there was one streak Calipari maintained over all 15 seasons he coached the Wildcats: Kentucky's streak of being ranked in the preseason Associated Press college basketball poll.

Starting with a preseason ranking of No. 4 when John Wall, Demarcus Cousins and Eric Bledsoe joined Calipari for his first season in 2009-10 and ending with Cal's worst preseason ranking of No. 16 last November, the Wildcats were a top 25 fixture for a decade and a half.

Don't look for Kentucky (or Louisville) in the preseason Top 25 next November.

A check of the latest preseason forecasts for next season from five sources shows the Wildcats (and Cardinals) will be missing in action.

Calipari, however, does project to begin next season in the Top 25 at Arkansas. Of course, starting strong was not the problem at UK the last five seasons. Finishing strong? That, we can discuss.

For Kentucky, that will be the case for the first time since 2008-09, Billy Gillispie's farewell season, and only the second time since 1992.

Whoa. Wow.

Things can change. Mark Pope, UK's new coach, has space to add a player or two to his first roster. Analysts have time to give the Wildcats a second or third look.

But I checked the latest forecasts from one computer formula (Bart Torvik) and four human polls (CBS Sports; ESPN; On3 Sports and Fox Sports).

Kentucky does not project as a Top-25 squad to begin next season, which does not qualify as Shock The World news considering that every player from Calipari's final squad (that lost to Oakland and stirred his departure) is going, going, gone.

However, seven Southeastern Conference teams do project as preseason Top-25 teams, including the one that Calipari has quickly assembled with a group of former UK parts in Fayetteville, Arkansas.

I averaged the numbers from the four human and one computer projections. The likely ranked teams from the SEC features this group:

No. 4: Alabama
No. 10: Auburn
No. 14: Tennessee
No. 17: Texas A&M
No. 18: Florida
No. 20: Texas
No. 22: Arkansas

Calipari's team is ranked as high as 15th by Gary Parrish at CBS Sports, especially after the news this week that former Florida Atlantic star Johnell Davis has removed himself from consideration for the NBA Draft next month and will play for the Razorbacks.

Local basketball fans had to laugh Wednesday at the message Calipari shared at the SEC spring meetings in Destin, Florida. He was asked what lessons he learned from his post-season struggles in Lexington.

"The lesson was you can't do this now with seven freshmen," he said. "You just can't.

MARK POPE AND PATRICK KELSEY - .jpg — University of Kentucky men's basketball coach Mark Pope (left) and University of Louisville men's basketball coach Patrick Kelsey. (Image of Pope courtesy of the Associated Press. Image of Kelsey is a WDRB pic)

"You're going to hit a team that's 25 years old on average — one was 26 — and that team is physically going to get you. And so now we have a couple transfers that are older, some kids that transferred from Kentucky that went through it, and they're a year older, and some freshmen."

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Jay Wright proved going old was the way to get the job done in 2016 and again in 2018 at Villanova. Tony Bennett followed that path at Virginia in 2019.

Apparently, Calipari truly did not read what people wrote about what ailed the Wildcats or listen to what folks said on talk radio. I heard it was a thing.

On to Louisville. With an entire new roster, a new head coach (Pat Kelsey) and a dismal three-season stretch of losing, the Cardinals will not project as a Top-25 squad in November.

Here are the Atlantic Coast Conference teams that will draw love:

North Carolina No. 7
Duke No. 8

That's the list.

That's encouraging news for the Cardinals. Grinding to the top of the ACC should not be as daunting as competing in the SEC, Big 10 or Big 12 with only two ACC squads registering as national powers.

The only local team to crack my consensus Top 25 was Mike Woodson's fourth squad at Indiana. The Hoosiers averaged No. 19, third in the Big Ten behind Purdue (No. 11) and UCLA (No. 16).

Woodson fetched five players from the transfer portal and insists he is committed to transforming IU's offense away from its dependence on low-post dominance.

Finally, here is the complete consensus rankings from the five polls: