Vicky Graff Photo
Kentucky coach Mark Pope doesn’t mind the national attention his team is receiving so far this season.
The fifth-ranked Wildcats (9-1) have defeated two top 10 foes — Duke and Gonzaga — and have taken care of business against other foes through the first 10 games. The lone setback was a 70-66 loss at Clemson in the ACC-SEC Challenge last week.
“I’m glad we are in the national conversation,” Pope said after a 78-67 win over Colgate Wednesday night. “That’s where we are supposed to be, it’s Kentucky, right? I’m really happy with all of that.”
The players, including Andrew Carr, also embrace the spotlight, but it hasn’t changed the team’s overall approach since the season began.
“It’s always good to know kind of where you’re at,” Carr said. “But for us, I think the greatest strength of our team throughout the entire season has just been having the chip on our shoulder. Being an underdog and kind of looked at, especially in these couple of big games as the underdog and coming into the season a lot of people had questions and doubts. I think it’s really kind of been a staple of the team. We love to embrace the underdog (role). Regardless of being ranked fifth, you always have that mindset.”
For Pope, improving is the bottom line and means more than climbing the national rankings.
“I just want us to be a great team, right? And we want to keep getting better,” he said. “ We had some runs (against Colgate) where we got better. We started the game better, and then the energy just turned a little bit on us. But we will learn from this and we will get better. Right now, it’s a race to get better.”
As the season progresses starting with Saturday night’s game against Louisville, Pope also knows every detail will be beneficial as the Wildcats begin building a resume for the postseason.
“It’s Kentucky (and) we have to win every game along the way,” Pope said. “That’s a beautiful thing and I’m not complaining, I think that’s why Kentucky is special. All of the things matter, everything matters. The metrics matter, the analytics matter, and the efficiencies matter.
“All of those things are really important to us. We would like to be the flagship program in every single category that we grade and rank and evaluate as a team. That’s our goal. It’s all really important.”
