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Former Kentucky coach Rick Pitino gave Mark Pope, one of his former players at UK, a ringing endorsement when he was hired to take over the program after John Calipari left for Arkansas.
Pope appreciated the tough love Pitino used and appreciates the lessons he learned playing for Pitino.
“Coach was the most demanding person I have ever been around,” Pope said. “In that relentless message there was always this subtext that I believe you can do it. It was just a relentless onslaught every day.
“It was brutal with the way he challenged us. He grew us through this unwaning belief that we had something in us and could do better.”
That belief helped Pope be part of the 1996 national championship team and go to a productive NBA career before he went into coaching.
“He really changed me. He has this fearlessness about him. it doesn’t matter if the whole world is falling down, he is pressing on and telling you it is sunny and you believe him,” Pope said.
“He has a way to put you in a bubble where the voices on the outside matter less and the voices on the inside matter more.”
That’s a great learning lesson and preparation for the job Pope now has because there are a lot of outside voices. That doesn’t mean Pope won’t ever listen because he tends to stay connected. However, it means he has to know how to keep things in perspective and my guess is that he’ll do that very, very well.
3 Responses
Mark will be creative with offense and disciplined with defense with a focus on team play on both ends.
UK has assembled the best coaching staff in the country. And we are going to beat Arkansas.
It was last century when UK had 3 great coaches – Rupp, Hall & Pitino.
This Century we just added a4th to that list – Coach Mark Pope. He will bring a lot of the Pitino intelligence & persistence back into UK BB with the proper focus – WIN !! Play for UK to WIN !!
Pitino said he asked players what their goal was. He wanted to be sure their goal was to WIN a National Championship before making an offer to play at UK. No ulterior motives, no NBA focus.