Johh Calipari says Kentucky no longer is the only SEC school getting elite recruits. (Vicky Graff Photo)
One word was all John Calipari needed to answer when asked if this was the best the Southeastern Conference has been since he came to UK for the 2009-10 season.
“Yeah,” Caliipari said Tuesday.
Kentucky opens SEC play tonight against Missouri — perhaps the worst team in the SEC with a 6-6 record. However, five SEC teams, including Kentucky, are ranked in the top 20.
“The goal always was, let’s get seven or eight teams in the NCAA Tournament when we were getting, what, three? And how do we do this? Well, part of it was the investment each school made in their basketball program,” Calipari said.
“I always say this: Coaches win basketball games; administrations win championships. And again, if you want to stay the gold standard – even us – you’ve got to go through your facilities and say, ‘Where are we stacking up against the best in what they’ve done?'”
Calipari said other SEC teams looked at what UK was doing and opted not to just try to do the same but do even better whether it was the Wildcat Coal Lodge where players live or the practice facility UK has.
“For us, again, administrations win championships. And so, for this league, administrations can pick up programs,” Calipari said. “Coaches will help them win games. But we’ve got terrific coaches.”
What about recruiting?
“The recruiting has gone to another level, and normally it was just Kentucky. ‘Well, they’ve got seven of the top whatever.’ Well, yeah and five of them are coming here. Now that’s not the case. Now all of a sudden, it’s 10, 12, 15 (highly rated) kids that are in the top coming to this league,” Calipari said.
“So you’ve got administrations that are committed, you’ve got coaches that can really coach, recruiting, which is added to having really good players, which is showing in the draft. You look at what’s happening here in this league, it’s really special.”
