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Kentucky athletic director Mitch Barnhart seems pretty content with where his basketball program is at the moment.
On Saturday, speaking on the program’s football pregame show, Barnart offered some praise for first-year head coach Mark Pope that briefly flipped to John Calipari shade.
“I tell people all the time (that) anybody can recruit, not everybody can evaluate,” Barnhart said. “You can recruit. You can be phenomenal at going out and bringing people to your program, but if it doesn’t fit you, it’s really not helpful.”
Mitch Barnhart with some interesting comments while praising Mark Pope pic.twitter.com/adRjjhztKl
— Matt Jones (@KySportsRadio) November 16, 2024
A common criticism of the Calipari era in Lexington was that the goal was not to win championships, but rather to send blue-chip prospects to the NBA as high draft picks. Calipari’s teams relied on youth and rarely enjoyed much continuity year-over-year.
This offseason, Calipari moved to Arkansas and was quickly replaced by Pope.
Kentucky is 3-0 to begin the Pope era, and that third victory sent shockwaves throughout the sport this past Tuesday when Kentucky downed No. 6 Duke 77-72 in the Champions Classic. The Wildcats turned Cooper Flagg over multiple times in the final minute to secure a win. Three UK players scored in double-figures to power the Wildcats to the win.
Pope’s first 2 games both featured 100-plus points on the scoreboard in blowouts.
Arkansas, meanwhile, is 2-1 to open the John Calipari era, dropping a 72-67 result to No. 8 Baylor in Dallas on Nov. 9.
Kentucky fans couldn’t have asked for a better start to the year.
Related Reading: And just like that, Mark Pope has brought back Kentucky basketball
Derek Peterson does a bit of everything, not unlike Taysom Hill. He has covered Oklahoma, Nebraska, the Pac-12, and now delivers CFB-wide content.
