Mark Pope admits he has mixed emotions about postgame handshake lines. (Vicky Graff Photo)
St. John’s coach Rick Pitino has never been shy about voicing his opinions and has made it clear that he believes the postgame handshake line should be eliminated.
Pitino believes players and coaches should leave the court after a game without going through the ceremonial handshake line.
What does Kentucky coach Mark Pope think about Pitino’s belief? Maybe it should be no surprise that Pope agrees with his former coach at Kentucky.
“It’s because I’m a terrible sport. I advocate that we shut down the handshake line when I lose and that we do it when I win,” Pope joked. “I’m a bad loser. I’m trying. I’m trying so hard. I got a whole psychology team that’s trying to help me do it better. Hopefully we don’t do it a lot.
“I think that we all have moments where we feel like why are we doing this and those are probably not our best moments. At the end of the day, I do think that athletics — I hope that athletics is about more — it can be deadly serious about winning, which it is. Like, we’re deadly serious about winning. And it can also be more.”
What about the more part?
“You think the deadly winning part is exhausting and taxing, it is, because it takes every ounce of everything that you are as a human being, because you’re competing against guys that are giving every ounce of everything, sacrificing everything that they have, to win. So sometimes to ask for more seems impossible,” Pope said.
“But the one great thing about athletes is they’re chasing the impossible. So can we be the most vicious, competitive, fighting people in the world and fight tooth and nail with every ounce of what we have to find a way to win? And then can we do more?
“Then can we actually be man enough to walk through a line and teach our guys to walk through a line that we don’t want to walk through, the guys we don’t want to shake their hands and do it out of the camaraderie of sports? That’s a tall order. But I like tall orders.”
Pope’s honesty can be refreshing and he’s always candid with his comments. That’s why he says he wants to do a “little bit more” than win at the highest level.
“That’s just one little way that I think we can do a little bit more,” the UK coach said. “I’d like to be mature enough — and I’m not — I’d like to be mature enough to keep chasing bigger and more important things than even just basketball.”
4 Responses
I don’t see anything purpose for it.
I dont know if anyone is paying attention but Louisville is lighting up the board in both football and basketball. In Basketball they have 2 of the best 15 transfers. A top 5 high school recruit who looks much more polished then our high school recruits and the 2 transfers they have signed are much better than the lone transfer we have. They’ve already passed us up in football and they should be even better this year then the last couple of years and in basketball Kelsey will have them much better in year 2. Yes the ACC is watered down now in both basketball and football but if we don’t start making some serious moves they will take the state over in both sports starting this year. If we lose to them back to back years in football and let them get our current winning streak out of the way in basketball watch out little brother might become big brother. I love Pope and how friendly he is but some players are looking for a coach and not a friend. Someone to push them to be the best version of themselves. Why he didn’t tell Williams if you don’t grab rebounds with 2 hands you won’t come off the bench boggles me. Also the 3 freshman didn’t get the experience at the beginning of the season to be a factor at the end of the year. I’m curious to see how much they improve from year 1 to year 2. If they can all double there scoring average which shouldn’t be hard it will make things easier on the whole team. Also how good are the freshman we are bringing in? I think Moreno is a 2 year a bolt to the NBA type of player. I also like the point guard we have coming in but I’m not sold on Jasper Johnson. I’m not taking nothing away from the kid because he’s a good ball player but the more I watch the more skeptical I am. He gets a lot of what I call junk baskets where he’s just way bigger than the guy guarding him and he makes a 7 foot floater that won’t work in the SEC. He does get hot from 3 but when he’s off he’s completely off. It also took him twice as !any shots to average less than other shooters in the class. He’s used to shooting the ball almost 20 times a game to average around 21 a game that won’t cut it. Hopefully Oweh comes back and Johnson can play behind him and learn in the process. I think he’s absolutely a 2-3 year college guy but who knows he could be freshman of the year in the SEC. Pope might spread to many minutes across the board but this was his first year and I think he was trying to build for a even better second year is why he started playing the freshman so much at the end of the year when we really needed to win. Some coaches have a 7 man rotation while others have 8-9 man rotations which to me is the best formula for winning. Your top guys don’t want to just play 25-27 minutes a game. Oweh needs to play a minimal of 30 minutes a game and if we lose him we will take a giant step back. He’s the difference in us having a proven all conference guy back next year and having unknown talent. You have to have someone who can take over the game and Oweh was the only guy on the team last year who could do just that. Yes all of the seniors had there bright spots but everyone was mainly great role players Oweh was the only all star on the team. He will be a 18-21 ppg type of player next year and maybe a all American if he continues to improve about 5ppg as he does every year. That shows that he’s working his butt off to get better. He might be the most talented player we’ve had come back in a very long time. He also has improved his 3 point shooting by at least 3-4% every year if he can get around 40% he will be unstoppable. I wouldn’t get anyone else unless they are the perfect fit. We need a post player and a point guard. That would give us 11 scholarships with 2 left. I wouldn’t give the last 2 out until we got the cream of the crop.
I don’t see the need to do the post either. A losing team especially probably doesn’t feel the need to. I think . I am a sore loser too. I stopped getting in the line when coaching middle school softball after we beat a team n one of their players hit my hand so hard it popped a blood vessel. I told my players we ain’t doing it anymore. lol We went undefeated that year n won county. That’s as far as you can go in WV Modcle Schools.
I have mixed feelings about the coaches handshake, but I think the players should continue.Lead by example works for me.
Terry I agree with everything you said.
Sounds like you have seen these incoming freshman play. Some of the freshman Allstars we have had in the past are too much in to themselves and not a team player.