John Calipari didn't mind talking about UK football and coach Mark Stoops Wednesday. (UK Athletics Photo)
Kentucky is ranked 10th in the AP preseason poll, coming off Big Blue Madness and looking forward to a potential national championship season. Yet at Wednesday’s Media Day, here is one of the questions that coach John Calipari got: How excited are you for (UK football coach) Mark Stoops, and is it refreshing to see the two sports coexisting so well?
Stoops’ Cats are 6-1 despite last week’s 30-13 loss at No. 1 Georgia and ranked 15th going into a game Oct. 30 at Mississippi State.
Calipari didn’t mind the question. In fact, he embraced a chance to spread the love not only about UK football but about UK athletics.
“First of all, we’ve always coexisted. Whoever was the coach — Rich (Brooks) was, but Mark and I are close. We’re from the same western Pennsylvania and Youngstown (Ohio). He talks — he’s one of my guys,” Calipari said. “But what he’s done here, which took time, this didn’t happen in two years. He did this over a period of time.
“I called him after Georgia and he was upset. I thought we could have played better. I said, ‘Mark, it was a rock fight. It was a rock fight. You’re not going to have execution. You’re trying to survive, and your kids never budged.’
“That crazy call, the fumble, I thought this was going to be — and then they score one play later, and it kind of changed things, and that’s sport. Especially Kentucky in football who are now vowing to have an undefeated season or a one-loss season, and it’s a little different when things happen.”
Calipari used Kentucky volleyball as what could be happening to UK football. Calipari recalled when UK volleyball coach Craig Skinner used to tell him “we can’t quite get over the hump.”
Calipari had what turned out to be a prophetic answer for Skinner.
“I said, ‘When you do, you will see you will be running downhill,’ and that was about five years ago, and his thing has done the same as Mark’s,” Calipari said.
Kentucky volleyball won a national championship last season and is ranked No. 5 nationally going into weekend matches with Arkansas.
However, talking football and volleyball only got Calipari warmed up even if it was basketball Media Day.
“I have to tell you that the commitment in all the sports here, new soccer stadium, new softball stadium, new baseball stadium, $190 million in football, you’re talking about what they’ve done for volleyball,” Calipari said.
“They’re trying to build more track. They’ve already built one, they’re trying to go with another one. You’re talking tennis. How about a (national champion) rifle team? We’ve got a bunch of snipers over there.
“The investment that’s been made here is in all the sports, so no one can say, ‘Well, they put all the money in basketball.’ That’s not what happened here. That’s not what happened here.”
He went on to note UK had created 6,000 “new beds” for students with a $3 billion housing plan.
“New student facilities, new places to eat, common areas to learn and teach each other and take this — I mean, there’s a lot,” Calipari said.
