LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- He came to Rupp Arena on a Friday night not just to coach, but to testify.
And by the time it was over — after 40 minutes of pressure defense, player development, and something that looked suspiciously like a basketball revival in front of a blue-clad crowd of 19,906— Mark Pope sat behind the mic and preached a gospel not found in the scouting report.
“If 51 percent of us can care about this team,” he said, “that would be unprecedented.”
And he didn’t mean care like run-back-on-defense care. Or call-out-the-switches care. He meant it like wash-your-teammate’s-feet care. Like give up your shot so someone else can shine care.
“If we can do that,” he said, “we’re going to be a great team. But we’re also going to be a great example to the world.”
Now you don’t hear that every night in a postgame press conference, exhibition or not. But then again, you don’t see Kentucky beat the No. 1 team in America — with two major pieces of its main rotation in warmups — every night either.
Mark Pope, bless him, opened his remarks with a line he borrowed from a sermon:
“If you know, you know.”
He wasn’t talking about basketball. He was talking about Jesus. But like any good coach — or preacher — he quickly pivoted to his congregation: the 18- to 22-year-olds he’s trying to turn into a team.
And on Friday night, for one exhibition game that didn’t count in the standings but just might in the storybooks, they played like they knew.
They played like something bigger was at stake. Not rankings. Not draft stock. Not NIL bonuses. Just each other.
They defended. They dove. They shared the ball like it was a loaf of bread. Turns out, it was enough to feed an entire arena.
Kentucky had 10 players play between 16 and 29 minutes. No one took more than 10 shots. Six players scored between 8 and 15 points. Purdue brought a couple of All-Americans. Kentucky brought a 42-30 rebounding edge.
And when Pope looked at the box score afterward, he didn’t see numbers. He saw 1996. A team so loaded and so loyal it made sacrifice a style of play.
“Can you do that in 2025-26?” he asked. “We’re going to see.”
But the sermon didn’t end there.
He named Collin Chandler his MVP. A player who scored two points but led the team in plus-minus. Plus-15 in just 16 minutes.
“That’s the defining feature,” Pope said. “That’s what we need.”
He praised Malachi Moreno for going from “soft” to “special,” Mouhamed Dioubate for playing like his “guts were spilling out all over the floor,” and Jaland Lowe — who didn’t even dress — as his second player of the game for leading from the bench.
He didn't just talk about spacing and screen assists. He talked about body language grades, emotional resilience and “guys loving each other.”
It was part TED Talk, part Purpose Driven Basketball.
Now, we’ve all seen early-season euphoria in Lexington before. We’ve seen November dominance turn to March disappointment. Pope knows it. He’s lived it.
But for one night in October, in front of a blue-clad congregation hungry for hope, he offered something deeper than X’s and O’s.
He offered a vision.
A team that plays “our way.” A group that says “next play” instead of “my bad.” A brotherhood held together not by hype, but by humility.
If 51 percent of them buy in?
Maybe they’ll move mountains. Or at least a few seed lines in March.
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