John Calipari knows what Oscar Tshiebwe and Sahvir Wheeler can do but will find out more about his other players in the Bahamas. (Vicky Graff Photo)
Coach John Calipari says Kentucky might be the only major basketball program in the nation to schedule its foreign exhibition tour as close to home as possible to make it easier for fans to travel with the team.
Kentucky will play four games in the Bahamas next month and Calipari knows it will help his team.
“We are bringing in pretty good teams and we will get to figure out some things about our team,” Calipari said. “We don’t know yet how good we will be. I think we will be good, but I don’t know. Remember the team that won 38 straight games (in 2014-15) lost its last game down there (in August of 2014).”
“But we get extra practice time and we can experiment with different things and different ways of playing.”
Kentucky’s limited practices this summer have been “fabulous” according to Calipari.
“You’ve got some vets, you’ve got some new guys, you’ve got some rookies. They’re all coming together,” Calipari said.
“I’m using the phrase, ‘You’re either ambitious or you’re entitled.’ ‘This is supposed to happen because I am and I…’ No, that’s not this team. They are ambitious.”
That certainly includes Oscar Tshiebwe, the unanimous national player of the year last season. He led the nation in rebounding last year but returned to UK for another season to show NBA personnel — and Calipari — he could do more.
“He’s been shooting 3’s, handling the ball better,” Calipari said. “I told him, ‘If you come back, you have to prove you’re a better basketball player. Or why would you come back? Be a second-round pick. Be 45 (overall). So what?'”
“If you want to be a first-round pick, when they watch you, they have to say, ‘Man, you’re a basketball player. They can’t just say you’re a rebounding machine.’ So now, you see him bouncing the ball, you see him shoot the ball, he’s improved.”
3 Responses
And I also remember the loss against Wisconsin in the final four that went wrong one is Cal let 2 players on the bench. that should have been playing instead of the Harrison boys and the no call that refs didn’t call on Wisconsin for the shot clock has expired.
It’s easy to Monday morning coach. Cal left the twins in because they were sophomores. They had big game experience. They win close games at the buzzer in tourney they had better game against Wisconsin and decker than Ulis and Booker. No way you put two unproven freshman in the game when you have two proven veterans plus Booker and ulis could not stop decker. They were not having a good game
If I remember correctly, after the 5 minute mark with a 5 point lead, we had three straight possessions where Andrew Harrison tried to single handedly burn time off the clock resulting in 3 consecutive shot clock violations where Wisconsin scored each trip. Once the Badgers had the lead, they never gave it up. One has to wonder if Ulis, who was a proven commodity, had been running the point, we would have at least got up a shot on each of those empty trips. It wasn’t a matter of stopping Dekker, because they didn’t. It was more the case of getting a good shot each time down the floor and the percentages and game time would have taken care of the rest. Andrew Harrison was never the player Calipari thought he was. This was the beginning of Calipari putting the good of his pets above the good of his team and it continues to this day.