Mark Pope had his players share their favorite NCAA Tournament memories Sunday. (Vicky Graff Photo)
Kentucky coach Mark Pope wanted his team to take in the NCAA bracket reveal in private on Sunday night.
Instead of being surrounded by boosters, fans and media, Pope chose for the Wildcats and no one else present. Kentucky is the No. 7 seed in the Midwest Region and will take on Santa Clara in the first round at 12:15 p.m. Friday in St. Louis.
“You’re always trying to read your team and kind of see where they are,” Pope said on his radio show Monday night. “… Everything that our guys have done all season long, from the very beginning, we’ve opened up to everybody, and there’s, there’s really been no filters with our whole program, and just this one moment, I just felt like it was really important that it was just our team, just the people in our locker room.”
Pope said the moment gave his team an opportunity to spend time together and “to kind of have some very personal, private conversations and to take in the moment of what these guys have, what these guys have accomplished so far this year, what they’ve endured so far this year, and what their hopes and aspirations and goals are for this coming NCAA tournament.”
“I thought it was really important that we just did this with just us; we don’t do anything that way, but just this one time,” he said. “I thought it was a big deal. We actually had a great night. It was a very meaningful night for our guys. I think it set the tone for us to give ourselves the best possible chance to make a magical run here. That’s what our goal is, and we’re going to see if we can do it.”
During the gathering, Pope had his players send him their favorite memory of watching the NCAA Tournament as a kid, which revealed some interesting responses, even though it wasn’t “largely choreographed.”
“It was really awesome to see the wide variety of responses that I got back,” he said. “All of us can tie moments of our life to some, some great play, some incredible moments, some last-second shot, some huge upset, some incredible run to the NCAA tournament and remember how those memories tie us so it’s pretty cool.”
As for Pope, his best memory was the 1992 Kentucky-Duke encounter that is considered one of the greatest games ever played in the Big Dance.
“I was sitting in my family room in Seattle with no real connection, at the time, to Kentucky,” Pope said. “When Christian Laettner hit that shot, I can remember it clearly. I can remember Sean Woods shot right before. I can remember my reaction literally as he went to take this 15-foot runner. I was like, ‘No’ and then I was like, ‘Yes, is it winning off the glass?’
“I remember that, and I remember the epic play by Bryce Drew in the Valpo game was pretty, pretty amazing. There are so many, there are so many great moments, and of course, the things that we got to experience in that championship game (in 1996) were really special.”
Pope and the Wildcats will begin what they hope is a magical run against Santa Clara. The Broncos are led by Herb Sendek, who served on Rick Pitino’s staff at Kentucky from 1989-93 before taking over the program at Miami of Ohio. Sendek has also coached at North Carolina State and Arizona State.
“He was the first assistant to reach out to me here when Kentucky started recruiting me,” Pope recalled. “He had an interesting path to coaching, as people know, he was a prestigious, I think, a summa cum laude graduate at Carnegie Mellon, and somehow lost his mind and decided to coach, and man, he’s had an incredible career. He’s one of the best people you’ll ever meet in your life.”
