Vicky Graff Photo
Kentucky has won one NCAA Tournament game and one SEC Tournament game since 2019. Kentucky is 2-8 in postseason play since 2019 and was favored in all 10 games.
Obviously those numbers hurt former Kentucky All-American Jack Givens and he made that clear after UK’s 80-76 loss to Oakland in the NCAA Tournament last week.
“It was a fun year, they are good guys and I feel sorry for everyone because I know they are hurting but this game was not played the way I thought it would be played,” Givens, the UK Radio Network analyst, said on the postgame show.
“One constant all the good teams have is they were good defensively. This team over the course of the season proved it was not consistently good defensively. The want-to is so huge on that. Want-to comes in when you are rebounding the basketball. It is easy to talk about that now but what a disappointing end to the season.”
It was and probably almost cost coach John Calipari his job despite his overall success rate at Kentucky based mainly on what he did his fist six years when he won a national title and went to the Final Four four times. Since 2015, UK has not been to a Final Four.
Calipari said on his radio show Monday that “we have got to get back to who we have been defensively and back to that physicality” his teams at UMass and Memphis always had and so did his early teams at Kentucky.
He told the radio audience he plans to start working on defense earlier than ever but knows that comes with a risk.
“How do you get back defensively? Some is you got to change people. The other side is what do you do in the summer. The reason I have always done things the way we have done in the summer is I didn’t want kids wore out so at the end of the year they were not performing,” Calipari said.
Calipari said that included letting his players have fun on exhibition trips to the Bahamas or Canada. He also will look at the team’s weight training.
“We are going to set a big-time foundation but if you really go at them in the summer will they wear out in the end,” Calipari told Tom Leach on his radio shot. “But I am convinced we have to get back to being that kind of team and I believe we will.”
Calipari said way too many teams, including Oakland, were older and more physical than Kentucky this season.
“Will guys that stay around (for next season at UK) get more physical? Will the freshmen have the physicality they need?” Calipari asked.
He didn’t know the answer but he better hope when the season starts in November that whatever changes he makes assure that the answer to both questions is yes.
23 Responses
Well, that’s a bummer. Was hoping Cal would be gone. Didn’t expect it,
but was still hoping. As I’ve tried to convince myself for the past 5 to 6
years; next year will be better.
Lol me too
Great. We certainly need to be more physical, particularly in the front court.
But the real question is: will Cal make the team’s success his top priority instead of player development for the NBA?
In other words, will he play a zone defense if that’s what it takes to win? Will he start his best players? Will he put his best lineup on the floor for most of the game even if that means benching some highly rated recruits?
If he had done just one of those things — the zone defense — this season, the Cats probably would be getting ready to play in the Sweet Sixteen.
This team was built for a zone defense, long, lean and very quick. The objective of the zone would be to deny and then jump passing lanes increasing the number of turnovers. It was just insane how cal kept doing something tha didn’t work.
I don’t see Cal’s problems being as much with the physicality of the team, it does need improvements, but it seems to be more just a total lack of game preparation. How many times over the last several years has UK started a game looking like they have no idea what to do? Starting out 10 points behind. Lacking knowledge on how to get the ball in bounds or even guarding an in bounds play. Lack of help defense. Lack of pressure on the 3 point line. Not running screens for your best shooters, etc, etc, etc. You can go through game film and just see glaring issue after issue that deal with lack of preparation.
I don’t see the final results next year being much better than this one. He still has several young players coming in, many will be gone from this team, so he will just use the same excuse of being young. Notice he never mentions that last years team was one of the oldest he has ever had, but still had the same results.
That’s very true. Every year same excuse. Either the players are not 5* so he can’t win because your right he had a older team last year. Or its they are 5* but they are too young. Its never I didn’t have them prepared. My game execution sucks. Every time its a close game we lose. We either blow a team out the water or we lose. Freshman are never consistent that’s why we suffer in the tournament. Notice you could count on Reeves to get 20 points but every game it was a different freshman who played great. With age comes consistency.
Nothing changes with the program.
The coach
The philosophy
The results
UK will end the year happy to have cleared the "bubble" again, will exit soon, AND will have a plethora of NBA Draft prospects.
After all, that is the goal established by the philosophy.
Why aren’t we all celebrating?
You have warmed season after season that UK would fizzle in the post season as long as the fraud is here. Some never learn but I’m happy to see so many true blue fans posting their disgust about the fraud,
Both the fraud and his money minion AD need to go, but after these miserable past 5 years, as well as no FF since he botched the 38-0 team by playing his pets… it obvious the fraud has too many folks under his power.
The University has sold out BBN. Texas A&M paid $70 million to get rid of Jimbo Fisher after 6 years of not living up to expectations. The Fraud has been here for 15 years and hasn’t done shit for the past 9 years! Our program is worth much more than $33 million dollars, or at least it was. Another year of Chokapari and we will be the next Indiana. I am done with Kentucky. I am not quitting on the University, the University quit on BBN!
In what I read in KSR article this morning Mitch did put a stop how Cal wants to run the program and will be major changes behind the scene and sideline staff as well. according the article it was said the program was in dismay unorganized mess.
Sad day for the program, BBN, our brand, and maybe even some of the players as well. Guess we will know real soon there. Cal has worn out his welcome, lost respect from much of the BBN, and continues to make us the laughing stock of the sports world. It will be predictably more of the same failed success and under achievement we have witnessed last 5 years. Cal said he wouldn’t change so the same talking points, condescension, smugness, coaching ineptness, and lack of player development destinued to continue.
Coach CALcified!
It is a sad day. Mitch took a cowardly stance by not making a change. If he was worried about his legacy, he sure has one now:
a) signing Cal to a lifetime contract that crippled any negotiations
b) overseeing a timeframe of deteriorating, embarrassing decline of both basketball programs
c) watching our biggest SEC rival (Tenn) dominate us in nearly every sport under his watch
…just to name a few.
Sick of Cal and all his crap. No enthusiasm for next season at all. Its been a very sad week.
Ditto!!!
Excellent points!
Sounds like you aren’t really a UK FAN
Hey Grover! Pull your head out of you azz!
Barry and the Cronies new song, "There’s a tear in my beer ’cause Calipari’s still here". Lol…I told you Cal wasn’t going anywhere. Barnhart is smarter than all you whiners.
Toughness is frame of mind.
Exactly, there are plenty of 250 lb. wusses.
Don’t hold your breath.
I think being physical is all on the player its something that is hard to teach. I mean you can smack them with pads when they go up for a lay up or dunk but that doesn’t translate to game action being physical. Somto Cyril who we have coming in I think he’s ranked #40 in the nation but reclassified. He would have been a top 10 recruit in 2015. He’s very physical. He plays like Oscar but he’s more physically gifted and a little bigger than Oscar was coming out of high school. I think he will stay 2-3 years. Word on the street is Ugo agent wants him to go pro so I think he will. He almost left last year but came back at the last second. To me his a bust in the NBA I don’t know how many layups and baby hook shots he missed right next to the basket. I don’t know why he didn’t just dumb the damn ball.
The fraud is a liar so we know he is not going to change anything. The dumb AD is a sick joke without a spine, the administrators who have allowed the UK BB program to be sold out by paying the fraud to do his own thing should all be fired. They are uselss, all the way up to the President. It is so pathetic that the question has to be asked – how many are getting under the table bonus money to not say a word!!!
I am furious with every enabler and every silent sidelined who has authority but won’t speak out to call the fraud out for his lies and failures!!!
To all who want the fraud gone, you are the true UK fans.
To the fraud supporters… not worth trying to educate them.