Smith or Calipari

[Pete Hogwallop]

Hate to say it, but its cal. Flubby inherited well oiled machine and turned it into an embarrassment. Cal took the embarrassment and turned it around overnight. uk basketball was back for awhile. Unfortunately both coaches became complacent after big contracts and and overstayed their welcome.

Any stats or back-up to the comment that Tubby turned it into an embarrassment? I for one was far more embarrassed at the state of the program the last few years of Cal than I ever was under Tubby. How can a 9-16 season not be more embarrassing than anything Tubby did? Or letting a player remain on the team who refuses to play (Sharpe) and then leaves?

[blueheretic]

Ask and ye shall receive. What many Kentucky fans found embarrassing about the Tubby Smith era (1997–2007).

The big ol' sore spots:

1. The 2004 UAB upset (as a No. 1 seed) - Kentucky was a top seed and national-title favorite, then got embarrassed in the Round of 32 by UAB. For a blue blood, that loss became the shorthand for “underachieved in March.”
   
   
   In a historic upset, the #9 seeded Alabama-Birmingham (UAB) Blazers defeated the #1 seeded Kentucky Wildcats 76-75 in the second round of the 2004 NCAA Tournament on March 21, 2004, in Columbus, Ohio. The game-winning basket was a 17-foot jumper by Mo Finley with 12.2 seconds left, and Kentucky's Gerald Fitch missed a final 3-pointer as time expired, sending the heavily favored Wildcats home.
   • Event: 2004 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament, Second Round
   • Teams: #1 Seed Kentucky vs. #9 Seed UAB
   • Outcome: UAB wins 76-75
   • Location: Columbus, Ohio
   • Key Play: Mo Finley's game-winning jumper with 12.2 seconds remaining
   • Significance: UAB's upset victory marked the program's first trip to the Sweet Sixteen since 1982 and a major upset of a top-seeded team.
2. No Final Fours after 1998 - won the 1998 title in Year 1, nine straight seasons without another Final Four. By Kentucky standards, that drought — despite good regular seasons — fueled the “great floor, low ceiling” narrative.
3. “Tubby ball” - slow pace, grind-it-out offense, late-clock possessions. Even when effective, it felt stale next to flashier peers. A lot of fans thought the brand didn’t match Kentucky’s identity.
4. Recruiting misses (headline: Chris Lofton) - passing on in-state star Chris Lofton — who went to Tennessee, became an SEC Player of the Year, and torched UK — became Exhibit A. More broadly, UK wasn’t landing enough elite scorers/creators to win in March. Not to mention Corey Brewer. There were others.
5. Postseason fade perception - teams that looked like world-beaters in January (e.g., the 26-game win streak in 2003) didn’t cash it in during the tournament (e.g., Dwyane Wade’s Marquette ended that run in the Elite Eight). Not shameful in isolation — Wade was special — but it fed the “can’t finish” story.
6. “Won with Pitino’s players” stigma - fair or not, critics said the ’98 title rode a core recruited by Rick Pitino. Tubby never built a second, Tubby-recruited title roster.
7. The exit optics - Leaving for Minnesota in 2007 looked like jumping before a push. For some, a UK coach choosing a lesser job read as an admission of how far the program’s swagger had slipped.

Of course, there is context. Smith still won...a lot - multiple SEC titles, Elite Eights, top-10 seasons. He, also, ran a "clean" program which probably hurt him. lol

The “embarrassing” label is largely Kentucky-level expectations. Tubby had some great regular season success without deep March runs. He coached a sluggish style. His recruiting was sporadic with a couple of signature misses (UAB; Lofton). He could never quite put a complete team together. By the time he left, his teams had glaring holes. That sticks in the craw. As with Cal after Bo Ryan stole his soul, it was glaringly obvious [to me] that Tubby would never again reach a Final Four when he lost to Michigan State the year after he won the '98 Championship.

The single MOST embarrassing part of the Tubby Smith experience was the fan hatred, the accusations of racism and how Kentucky fans turned on each other. If one had so much as a minor complaint about Tubby, one was called a racist. I know Black dudes who were called racists by White folks because they dared criticize Orlando "Tubby" Smith. This was the number one most embarrassing and disgusting piece of that era in Kentucky Basketball. It's got absolutely nothing to do with Tubby but it caused quite a bit of heartburn within the fan base.

One of my best experiences at Rupp Arena was a Tubby team. Florida came in ranked #1 and Tubby's Cats trounced them. My body vibrated for days and I was hoarse for a week. That ish was awesome!

1998 was a heckuva season that I was fortunate enough to watch from Egypt with a group of fellow College Basketball fans. I'll always be grateful to Tubby for that experience.

[samsdad]

I remember you calling Tubby TLT.

[SportsFan]

blueheretic

Alright! That was really well done. Very nice job!

Now, it's time for one on Cal. You know...the NIT year, the losing season and missing the tournament, all the really bad regular season losses, first round losses and times not making it to the second weekend in March Madness, kneeling for BLM, going on record as to how NBA draft night was the greatest moment in Kentucky basketball history, how he practically forced guys out the door rather than retain them for a second season, the arrogance and condescending attitude, not making a Final Four his last 9 years at UK (since 2015), etc., etc.

Looking forward to it.

[blueheretic]

I remember you calling Tubby TLT.

I did. I did.

Ten Loss Tubby!!! lol

[blueheretic]

blueheretic

Alright! That was really well done. Very nice job!

Now, it's time for one on Cal. You know...the NIT year, the losing season and missing the tournament, all the really bad regular season losses, first round losses and times not making it to the second weekend in March Madness, kneeling for BLM, going on record as to how NBA draft night was the greatest moment in Kentucky basketball history, how he practically forced guys out the door rather than retain them for a second season, the arrogance and condescending attitude, not making a Final Four his last 9 years at UK (since 2015), etc., etc.

Looking forward to it.

That wasn't the question.

You can do it.

[blueheretic]

blueheretic

Alright! That was really well done. Very nice job!

Now, it's time for one on Cal. You know...the NIT year, the losing season and missing the tournament, all the really bad regular season losses, first round losses and times not making it to the second weekend in March Madness, kneeling for BLM, going on record as to how NBA draft night was the greatest moment in Kentucky basketball history, how he practically forced guys out the door rather than retain them for a second season, the arrogance and condescending attitude, not making a Final Four his last 9 years at UK (since 2015), etc., etc.

Looking forward to it.

You must have read EXTREMELY selectively if you missed this:

"As with Cal after Bo Ryan stole his soul..."

That should have told you that I am not the greatest fan of Cal.

But people will be people.

[blueheretic]

There was a time that I hated Tubby.

Then I realized that it wasn't Tubby.

It was the Tubby Cult acolytes.

[blueheretic]

Tubby was cool as hell.

I wrote him a letter the day after the '98 Championship.

He replied.

I replied.

He replied.

With one of the letters, I sent some MFO paraphernalia.

A unit path. The insignia that we wore on our berets.

A few years later, I was at Rupp and met him. I got him to sign my Sports Illustrated Comeback Cats Championship magazine. I mentioned that I'd sent him a letter from Egypt. He remembered it. He stood there and talked to me about my expereinces in the MFO in Egypt and remembered the letters and the stuff that I sent.

Tubby was a cool dude.

I loved him personally.

I didn't exactly love the basketball outcomes.

At the end of the day, Kentucky Basketball is about reaching for greatness.

Kentucky Basketball is not about settling.

It's about reaching for the stars.

The years passed and I let that ish go.

[SportsFan]

You must have read EXTREMELY selectively if you missed this:

"As with Cal after Bo Ryan stole his soul..."

That should have told you that I am not the greatest fan of Cal.

But people will be people.

I was simply trying to encourage you to display equal time to both coaches. You did so well with Tubby I thought that perhaps you might do the same with Cal.

As for my thoughts on Cal, they're pretty well documented throughout this forum, even with a weeks worth of posts having been deleted.

[KYNomad]

Ask and ye shall receive. What many Kentucky fans found embarrassing about the Tubby Smith era (1997–2007).

The big ol' sore spots:

1. The 2004 UAB upset (as a No. 1 seed) - Kentucky was a top seed and national-title favorite, then got embarrassed in the Round of 32 by UAB. For a blue blood, that loss became the shorthand for “underachieved in March.”
   
   
   In a historic upset, the #9 seeded Alabama-Birmingham (UAB) Blazers defeated the #1 seeded Kentucky Wildcats 76-75 in the second round of the 2004 NCAA Tournament on March 21, 2004, in Columbus, Ohio. The game-winning basket was a 17-foot jumper by Mo Finley with 12.2 seconds left, and Kentucky's Gerald Fitch missed a final 3-pointer as time expired, sending the heavily favored Wildcats home.
   • Event: 2004 NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament, Second Round
   • Teams: #1 Seed Kentucky vs. #9 Seed UAB
   • Outcome: UAB wins 76-75
   • Location: Columbus, Ohio
   • Key Play: Mo Finley's game-winning jumper with 12.2 seconds remaining
   • Significance: UAB's upset victory marked the program's first trip to the Sweet Sixteen since 1982 and a major upset of a top-seeded team.
2. No Final Fours after 1998 - won the 1998 title in Year 1, nine straight seasons without another Final Four. By Kentucky standards, that drought — despite good regular seasons — fueled the “great floor, low ceiling” narrative.
3. “Tubby ball” - slow pace, grind-it-out offense, late-clock possessions. Even when effective, it felt stale next to flashier peers. A lot of fans thought the brand didn’t match Kentucky’s identity.
4. Recruiting misses (headline: Chris Lofton) - passing on in-state star Chris Lofton — who went to Tennessee, became an SEC Player of the Year, and torched UK — became Exhibit A. More broadly, UK wasn’t landing enough elite scorers/creators to win in March. Not to mention Corey Brewer. There were others.
5. Postseason fade perception - teams that looked like world-beaters in January (e.g., the 26-game win streak in 2003) didn’t cash it in during the tournament (e.g., Dwyane Wade’s Marquette ended that run in the Elite Eight). Not shameful in isolation — Wade was special — but it fed the “can’t finish” story.
6. “Won with Pitino’s players” stigma - fair or not, critics said the ’98 title rode a core recruited by Rick Pitino. Tubby never built a second, Tubby-recruited title roster.
7. The exit optics - Leaving for Minnesota in 2007 looked like jumping before a push. For some, a UK coach choosing a lesser job read as an admission of how far the program’s swagger had slipped.

Of course, there is context. Smith still won...a lot - multiple SEC titles, Elite Eights, top-10 seasons. He, also, ran a "clean" program which probably hurt him. lol

The “embarrassing” label is largely Kentucky-level expectations. Tubby had some great regular season success without deep March runs. He coached a sluggish style. His recruiting was sporadic with a couple of signature misses (UAB; Lofton). He could never quite put a complete team together. By the time he left, his teams had glaring holes. That sticks in the craw. As with Cal after Bo Ryan stole his soul, it was glaringly obvious [to me] that Tubby would never again reach a Final Four when he lost to Michigan State the year after he won the '98 Championship.

The single MOST embarrassing part of the Tubby Smith experience was the fan hatred, the accusations of racism and how Kentucky fans turned on each other. If one had so much as a minor complaint about Tubby, one was called a racist. I know Black dudes who were called racists by White folks because they dared criticize Orlando "Tubby" Smith. This was the number one most embarrassing and disgusting piece of that era in Kentucky Basketball. It's got absolutely nothing to do with Tubby but it caused quite a bit of heartburn within the fan base.

One of my best experiences at Rupp Arena was a Tubby team. Florida came in ranked #1 and Tubby's Cats trounced them. My body vibrated for days and I was hoarse for a week. That ish was awesome!

1998 was a heckuva season that I was fortunate enough to watch from Egypt with a group of fellow College Basketball fans. I'll always be grateful to Tubby for that experience.

I have always felt that not only did Tubby win the championship with Pitino’s players, they won the championship in spite of Tubby’s coaching. That team was “The Comeback Cats.” My thought was that they were The Comeback Cats, because after they’d get behind using Tubby’s style of play, the players reverted to Pitino’s style of play and turned losing games into winning games. They abandoned Tubby’s way, went with what they already knew and won games with Pitino’s way.

[blueheretic]

Here’s the blunt list of what many Kentucky fans found embarrassing in the Calipari era


March face-plants

• 2018: Sweet 16 loss to Kansas State in a region that was WIDE OPEN up for a Final Four run.
• 2022: 2-seed Kentucky lost to 15-seed Saint Peter’s — one of the biggest upsets in NCAA history.
• 2023: Second-round loss to Kansas State (again), with late-game execution issues AKA PREVENT OFFENSE
• 2024: First-round loss to 14-seed Oakland, punctuated by a role player BOMBING threes—another shocker for a blue blood. A dude who was 30 years old who was left WIDE OPEN to knock down threes and it was obvious that he should have been shut down to kill Oakland - Cal lost that game due to his own stupidity.

The 9–16 season (2020–21)

• Worst UK record in nearly a century. HUMILIATING! Cal should have been fired. Right there. Terminated!

“NBA factory” > program results

• The one-and-done pipeline produced lottery picks WITHOUT COLLEGIATE RESULTS! Fans felt team maturity and March execution suffered. Critics said the NBA draft became the program’s north star more than Final Fours. Those players stopped coming because Cal produced nothing.

Stubborn scheme & late-game management

• Reliance on dribble-drive/ISO and drop coverage on defense when personnel didn’t fit; limited in-game adjustments; end-of-game sets often devolved into difficult shots.

Underachieving relative to talent

• Frequent top-5 recruiting classes, but no Final Fours after 2015. The 38–1 team (2015) is remembered as a missed banner after losing to Wisconsin.

PR/self-inflicted wounds

• “Basketball school” remark (2022) that sparked a public spat with the football program.
• Occasional tone-deaf comments after losses (“we’re young,” “it’s a process”) read as excuse-making.

Contract optics

• The massive “lifetime” deal and buyout made change feel impossible even as results slid—fans hated the golden-handcuffs dynamic.

Post-season SEC/Tourney rhythm

• Too many years where the team peaked early or never solved defensive rebounding/physicality, then got out-toughed in March.

---

Bottom line: For a place that measures coaches by banners, the combination of historic early exits (Saint Peter’s, Oakland), the 9–16 debacle, and a sense that scheme/adjustments lagged the modern game made parts of Cal’s tenure genuinely embarrassing to Kentucky standards—despite undeniable early-era success and NBA star production.




Most of this is from AI because I don't care.

Bottom line. Cal was a fraud. F R A U D

[davtay]

Here’s the blunt list of what many Kentucky fans found embarrassing in the Calipari era


March face-plants

• 2018: Sweet 16 loss to Kansas State in a region that was WIDE OPEN up for a Final Four run.
• 2022: 2-seed Kentucky lost to 15-seed Saint Peter’s — one of the biggest upsets in NCAA history.
• 2023: Second-round loss to Kansas State (again), with late-game execution issues AKA PREVENT OFFENSE
• 2024: First-round loss to 14-seed Oakland, punctuated by a role player BOMBING threes—another shocker for a blue blood. A dude who was 30 years old who was left WIDE OPEN to knock down threes and it was obvious that he should have been shut down to kill Oakland - Cal lost that game due to his own stupidity.

The 9–16 season (2020–21)

• Worst UK record in nearly a century. HUMILIATING! Cal should have been fired. Right there. Terminated!

“NBA factory” > program results

• The one-and-done pipeline produced lottery picks WITHOUT COLLEGIATE RESULTS! Fans felt team maturity and March execution suffered. Critics said the NBA draft became the program’s north star more than Final Fours. Those players stopped coming because Cal produced nothing.

Stubborn scheme & late-game management

• Reliance on dribble-drive/ISO and drop coverage on defense when personnel didn’t fit; limited in-game adjustments; end-of-game sets often devolved into difficult shots.

Underachieving relative to talent

• Frequent top-5 recruiting classes, but no Final Fours after 2015. The 38–1 team (2015) is remembered as a missed banner after losing to Wisconsin.

PR/self-inflicted wounds

• “Basketball school” remark (2022) that sparked a public spat with the football program.
• Occasional tone-deaf comments after losses (“we’re young,” “it’s a process”) read as excuse-making.

Contract optics

• The massive “lifetime” deal and buyout made change feel impossible even as results slid—fans hated the golden-handcuffs dynamic.

Post-season SEC/Tourney rhythm

• Too many years where the team peaked early or never solved defensive rebounding/physicality, then got out-toughed in March.

---

Bottom line: For a place that measures coaches by banners, the combination of historic early exits (Saint Peter’s, Oakland), the 9–16 debacle, and a sense that scheme/adjustments lagged the modern game made parts of Cal’s tenure genuinely embarrassing to Kentucky standards—despite undeniable early-era success and NBA star production.




Most of this is from AI because I don't care.

Bottom line. Cal was a fraud. F R A U D

I liked Cal, but it was time for a change. If we are listing reasons, we must not forget home losses to teams like Evansville and UNC Wilmington.

[davtay]

I have always felt that not only did Tubby win the championship with Pitino’s players, they won the championship in spite of Tubby’s coaching. That team was “The Comeback Cats.” My thought was that they were The Comeback Cats, because after they’d get behind using Tubby’s style of play, the players reverted to Pitino’s style of play and turned losing games into winning games. They abandoned Tubby’s way, went with what they already knew and won games with Pitino’s way.

No disrespect to you, but I think this is utter nonsense.

That team only lost 5 games. It was a combination of Tubby's coaching and the teams experience in big games. I guarantee that Tubby was a huge reason in the win over Duke. And of course, you have the player's themselves who have debunked this incorrect view of the season/tournament.

[MegaBlue05]

The obvious answer is Cal just based on the three additional FFs and one additional runner-up.

You can not like the guy personally or think his last few years tainted his legacy, but his overall body of work is much stronger than Tubby's. The only real edge Tubby has is his worst seasons aren't nearly as bad as Cal's worst seasons. Tubby never missed the tournament, but also never got back to the FF after his first year. Cal went to the FF 4 times in in 5 years, but also missed the tournament twice and had a losing season.