LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) – Kentucky basketball coach is not job to which most people, even within the coaching profession, realistically aspire. In 94 years, they’d had just seven of them when John Calipari made the shocking decision to walk away last April.
It’s not exactly a position where you submit your info to ZipRecruiter and wait for a call. It takes a special turn of events, often an earth-shattering turn, to create that opening. And when it does happen, there might be five people in the country with a realistic shot of getting it. Maybe.
Perspective: There have been more Presidents of the United States in the past 94 years (16) than Kentucky basketball coaches, and the same number of Popes.
And now look – Kentucky has both. To be in this job, for Mark Pope, is quite a turn.
Quick personal aside: I can relate, in just a very small way. When I was growing up riding the bus to school and talking sports every morning out in Bagdad, Ky., there had only been five sports columnists at The Courier-Journal in my lifetime. Earl Ruby, Earl Cox, Dave Kindred, Billy Reed and Rick Bozich. Pat Forde would come along later, and when he left, Jerry Brewer.
So when I went after it, you know, it was not a chance that came along every day. You just hope the stars align, or that Brewer was too talented to hang around for very long. Regardless, they didn’t hand out those jobs like coupons. I remember thinking two things: How did I get this? How am I going to do this?
That was easy stuff compared to the job Pope landed. Monday night at 7 when he steps onto the Rupp Arena court for his first regular-season game on the Kentucky sidelines against Wright State, it will be a rare moment.
“You don’t think it’s going to happen,” Pope told WDRB’s Tyler Greever in an interview in June. “It just doesn’t. You don’t get this opportunity. Nobody gets this opportunity. No one gets to coach at Kentucky. . . . You just never really think you’re going to get a chance to get the best job ever.”
Pope, probably more than any coach who has had the job since Adolph Rupp, has communicated eloquently the experience of the job – and probably more of the joy of it and less of the pressure. Maybe because the pressure hasn’t started yet. That will change when the ball gets tipped Monday night, too.
There is pressure. Those seven guys who preceded Pope? More of them are in the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame than aren’t. And a couple who aren’t in should be.
You have to win. There are no term limits with this job, but there are minimum standards. Final Fours. National championships. Pope gets that. It has not changed from his playing days for Rick Pitino on an NCAA title team. He understands the assignment. In fact, he calls the team’s NCAA championship goal, “Assignment No. 9.”
New Kentucky men's basketball head coach Mark Pope sat down with WDRB sports director Tyler Greever to discuss his dream job.
“This is Kentucky basketball,” Pope said. “You can try and go out there and moderate expectations but that's not going to be accepted by anybody. If you want to moderate expectations, don't take the job of the University of Kentucky. Because there’s one thing that's expected here, and there's one thing that that will seal your tenure and a player and that’s to win a championship. So, it's terrifying for sure. And it's daunting, and it's humbling because you understand how hard it is. I’m not naïve to understanding that's why no coach at any other program in the country is going to come say the things in their introductory press conference that I said here at the University of Kentucky, because it's that hard, it is nearly impossible. It’s just that this is the one program in all of college basketball where nothing less is acceptable. And, and I want it. I want that challenge.”
Expectations nationally are unusually low. Kentucky was ranked No. 23 in the preseason. The Wildcats were picked to finish eighth in the SEC. For some, Pope is just an alum who came back to UK from BYU. But his Rick Pitino pedigree and bottom-up rise in the profession shouldn't be overlooked.
Pope has built a deep and experienced team that has come together quickly. Lamont Butler is a steadying influence at point guard. Jaxson Robinson is a star in waiting. The Wildcats can shoot from deep. Offense is back on the menu.
“Every time you miss a shot, you're one shot closer to making one,” Pope said. “Like, that's just the truth.”
He also has praised his team’s attitude and willingness to learn, and said he takes confidence from that.
“Our locker room is a good place, right?” Pope said. “And we have guys that are humble and curious and want to be good and want to get better. And, you know, we're going to absorb a bunch of frustration for sure and take some shots to the face from time to time. But I think it's a good group, and I think it's a group that has some resilience.”
On Monday night, many of them will begin an experience they never expected at this time a year ago. Their coach will be in the same boat.
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