Mark Pope's Kentucky Hiring: A Turning Point for Big Blue?

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00:00 [MUSIC]

00:03 Time to talk some Kentucky basketball, but we gotta set the stage here in

00:06 the morning of how well things appear to be going with Big Blue Nation.

00:10 Let's take a look at that press conference here with Mark Pope.

00:13 >> As we see these introductory press conferences all the time now,

00:17 nobody in the world has ever seen anything like this.

00:21 >> [APPLAUSE]

00:28 >> I'm about to break tradition.

00:30 >> [APPLAUSE]

00:40 >> I'm about to break tradition.

00:49 At every one of these press conferences, the coach comes up and

00:53 he stands there with the AD and they take a picture with a jersey that they just made

00:58 and ends up in a closet somewhere.

00:59 We're not doing that here.

01:00 >> [APPLAUSE]

01:10 >> How about that, the big rally.

01:15 22,000 people show up to try to convince themselves that Mark Pope is the right

01:20 hire for Kentucky, so let's have at it round two.

01:23 Mark, is this the right move for Kentucky?

01:26 Are they back on track?

01:27 >> Well, look, I mean, there are people who get their sixth choice for

01:32 senior prom and end up marrying them.

01:34 I'm just probably not gonna be one of them.

01:36 So that is Kentucky right now as they went through several other options and

01:40 finally landed on Mark Pope and quote, got the guy they wanted.

01:44 Yeah, well, it was a job that nobody wanted.

01:47 Otherwise, there would be a different coach there and

01:49 there would be a different celebration.

01:50 And maybe 22,000 people would have showed up regardless of who got that job.

01:54 But look, if you wanna win the press conference, they did it, right?

01:58 If you wanna win the moment and make yourself feel good about the actual hire,

02:03 they absolutely did that.

02:04 I think they were smart to play it up the way that they did.

02:07 But at the end of the day, when they start bouncing balls in October,

02:12 if you don't start winning games and win them quick at Kentucky, guess what?

02:15 Everyone's gonna laugh at the whole press conference.

02:17 Everyone's gonna laugh at the 96 team getting off the bus.

02:20 And everyone's gonna laugh at Kentucky.

02:22 Now, I'm not saying that's gonna happen.

02:23 But ultimately, what we talked about with this job and what you and

02:27 I agreed with that Ben sort of disagreed with,

02:31 with the idea that it's not a top job anymore because the expectations aren't

02:35 going to match what the reality is.

02:37 And right now, Kentucky doesn't match reality of the expectations because,

02:42 guess what?

02:42 They haven't been a very consistent basketball team,

02:45 particularly on the defensive end.

02:46 Now, will Mark Pope fix that?

02:47 BYU is 60th in the country in defensive efficiency last year.

02:51 That's a big upgrade from where Kentucky was.

02:53 But can they do it?

02:55 And can they do it in the SEC is a different conversation.

02:58 [MUSIC]

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