Time to say it

[***St.Patterson-54***]

GOOD coaches find a way to make adjustments to play to the strengths of the hand they've been dealt due to injuries. For the last two years, Pope has not made the correct adjustments. So what does that make him?

[ganner918]

GOOD coaches find a way to make adjustments to play to the strengths of the hand they've been dealt due to injuries. For the last two years, Pope has not made the correct adjustments. So what does that make him?

Last year I think he achieved about as much as he could have after all the injuries. We managed to play through a point center a lot of the time and were winning games against good teams with a heavily depleted roster when ALL our point guard options were sitting out hurt.

The bigger problems aren't in adjustment to injuries - it's the slow starts last year and this year, the failure to show up and compete and getting beaten by teams we should expect to win against, the substitution patterns that by now he should have enough data collected to know aren't working, the persistent defensive struggles, the inability to recruit out of high school, the lack of closing on top portal targets, and the failure this year to assemble a roster that fits the system he wants to run (and after a year where injuries hurt us bad only having ONE point guard who'd already had injuries in his past).

[bthaunert]

Fact is...it was a terrible hire when it was made and it's still a terrible hire. Mark Pope was probably the 30th - 40th most qualified person for the job. And we went after him as the #3 candidate. Dude would have crawled to Lexington if he was the 107th candidate. There was no need to panic and move to him so quickly.

Pope hasn't finished in the top 4 of his conference the last 4 years, soon to be 5 at the end of this year. You're telling me, we hired a guy that struggled in the WCC and Big 12 (26-23 in conference) the 3 seasons prior to UK and thought he would magically become better because he came to Kentucky? We hired a guy who left 2 programs (Utah Valley & BYU) where they got better after he left and we thought he would be good at UK?

I said it during the search and I will say it again. Once your top 2 candidates (one of the top 2 was meh anyways) turned you down, you should have immediately turned to Kelvin Sampson. Would he have been short term hire? yes. Would he have had a lot better chance building the program up to where it needs to be prior to turning it over to someone else? absolutely. He is the best coach in college basketball not named Danny Hurley.

So, we know Pope is here next year and I get that we aren't going to fire him after 2 years. Joker got 3 years and Pope will get 3 years. But where do we go next? Tommy Lloyd? TJ Otzelberger? Maybe a guy like Josh Schertz? Number 3 might be a stretch but I'm not sure what the answer is. That scares the hell out of me with Mitch. I think Mitch has done some great things with the athletic department in his years here. But, he's also screwed up a lot lately with contracts and hires. He needs to retire, they need to turn it over to someone like Cam Walker from Utah State, who did some great things at UT as Deputy AD. The dude is brilliant and has the pulse of the new world of college athletics big time.

Anyways, I'm just frustrated. I hated the hire the moment it happened, got swept up by nostalgia with the introductory press conference and have come to realize it's just not going to work. What cannot happen is he makes a Sweet 16 run next year (which adds an additional year to his contract thanks to Mitch) and people be satisfied with that.

[ganner918]

I was.... shocked at the hire and just thinking "wow, he's gonna have to prove it to me, I can't believe we're having to take such a risk like this." I was actually encouraged after year one, seeing us beat a lot of good teams and persist through adversity. I figured if he'd been able to put that team together that quickly starting from zero, surely he'd get better talent (and have better injury luck) in the future and that he was on his way to proving himself... "Jimmies and Joes" can go a long way to making a coach look better and we just didn't get them and certainly aren't getting them out of high school next year. Meanwhile the coaching deficiencies are getting highlighted more and more.

[WeWant9]

I know Pope gets year 3, but I really hope Barnhart retires this summer. Honestly, if he is back for another year then I truly question what the overall goals are of UK athletics.

I do not have much faith that Pope is the guy for this job, or that he has enough runway to try and figure it out. The program is falling behind in ways I didn't think were possible for UK basketball (granted that's not all on Pope). If I was Pope, I'd do whatever I could to land Stokes. If this season ends as its going, there would be zero momentum, zero recruits, and zero excitement heading into the offseason. That's a death sentence for any coach.

[thebluestripes]

I wanted pope to do well but he clearly should be coaching a mid level school and not a school like ky. The job is proving to be too much for him unfortunately. With that said next year is his make or break but he shouldn't be canned this year, although I'd be more than fine with it

[***St.Patterson-54***]

Pope is now 25-21 against P5 competition.

I just threw up in my mouth a little bit after reading that.

[westerncat]

I was all in on Pope being hired and I think he is the man for the job. I truly believe there are things going around the program that he has to overcome. We have to understand that he has 3 good players that are out right now and that really hurts this team. We really do not have a backup PG and even Pope and the staff could not foresee the injuries that we have right now. Johnson is playing like a 1st year player and is not contributing to this team now but if he stays and puts on weight he will be better next year.
This NIL has really changed CBB overall. Schools that have big donors are making their men basketball better because of the money they have and I don't see this changing any time soon. I have heard rumors that there is one player that is causing problems but don't know if this is true or not. Talk about freeing Pope now is just plain dumb !