Another special announcement coming Wednesday

[lilproUK98]

I also said anything can happen in the tournament. Just look at 2011 and 2014. Maybe they catch lightening in a bottle again. It will be a fun year but I won't be expecting a national championship.

I never ever "expect" a Championship. I do see that we have a great team and expect that we will have a chance. And, on paper we have as good a chance as anybody. You have to play the games, and so does Duke. So before we hand over the trophy to Duke, let's see what the two teams actually do. UK was far and away the favorite last year and look what happened. The mentality that Duke is just this unstoppable force is just silly. Grayson Allen and others don't scare me one bit. Look at what we did to hime and Duke.in general this past year. The way coach K teaches defense plays right into our hands. Our guards create bad situations for Duke. I like our chances against them and anyone else next year. Let's just see how it plays out first.

[Joneslab]

I remember UK in the BC era, (before Cal). We, the fan base, were always wondering and hoping that a top recruit would pick Kentucky to be the place to play their college ball. I believe that a segment of the fan base has forgotten how bad it was in the BC era, when the best players were few and far between on the Kentucky campus. Since the beginning of the Calipari era, I have not worried about recruiting. It does not bother me that there is a (gasp) down year once in awhile, mixed in with all the other years, when the Cats are one of the top contenders.

The best post in the thread.

We have VERY short memories. Very short.

[Joneslab]

I never ever "expect" a Championship. I do see that we have a great team and expect that we will have a chance. And, on paper we have as good a chance as anybody. You have to play the games, and so does Duke. So before we hand over the trophy to Duke, let's see what the two teams actually do. UK was far and away the favorite last year and look what happened. The mentality that Duke is just this unstoppable force is just silly. Grayson Allen and others don't scare me one bit. Look at what we did to hime and Duke.in general this past year. The way coach K teaches defense plays right into our hands. Our guards create bad situations for Duke. I like our chances against them and anyone else next year. Let's just see how it plays out first.

Duke will be, and should be, the favorite.

Doesn't bother me. I don't understand losing all perspective because Kentucky won't have an easy road. When is it ever an easy road? We probably needed Kendall Marshall to be injured in 2012, and even then we had to run an ungodly gauntlet full of traditional rivals through the NCAA Tournament.

It's never easy. All you hope as a fan is that you have the personnel to be in the mix. If you're in the mix enough, you'll win the whole thing eventually. With as strong as this recruiting class and with as many to players as we're in on next year, you just hope Kentucky is in the mix. That's all you can ask for. Because for so many years before Cal, we weren't in the mix.

Yeah, it would be better if we had four-year guys who we watched grow, who came along, matured, gave us some experience. But other programs have had those four-year guys and haven't done anything in the postseason during those players' careers. Powerhouse programs like Kansas. So nothing is foolproof. Everything is hard and unpredictable in this game.

[lilproUK98]

I, for one, am GLAD Duke is the favorite next year. I've never liked being labeled the favorite to start a season.

[Lighthouse]

We all, as KENTUCKY Fans, live every day expecting a National Championship. We can say we don't, but it's in our genes that anything less is a let down. I, along with most other Kentucky fans, look back over a season like this one and think what could have been. Realistically, after watching the Final Four, we were better than Syracuse but the other three were better than us.

[lilproUK98]

We all, as KENTUCKY Fans, live every day expecting a National Championship. We can say we don't, but it's in our genes that anything less is a let down. I, along with most other Kentucky fans, look back over a season like this one and think what could have been. Realistically, after watching the Final Four, we were better than Syracuse but the other three were better than us.

Really???

I almost never go into a season EXPECTING a Championship. I think expecting is the wrong word. That's just too definitive. In 2012 and 2015 I got my hopes to maximum peak and we won one out of two. The other 5 Calipari seasons I have not expected a Championship. Call me crazy. I am always very hopeful but also realistic.

[Joneslab]

We all, as KENTUCKY Fans, live every day expecting a National Championship. We can say we don't, but it's in our genes that anything less is a let down.

I think a Final Four season is a success.

We only have eight championships. Relatively that's a lot, but in the sweep of this game's history it isn't.

If you go to a Final Four you generally have had a solid season. 2015 was a letdown with the way it ended, and nobody will remember it the way we did the title years, but that was a great, historical year. 2014 was maybe the most fun I've ever had as a fan.

If you get there to that last weekend, anything can happen. You can't treat Final Fours like title years after everything's said and done, but you can appreciate them a whole lot--which is why we hang banners for them.

[lilproUK98]

Duke will be, and should be, the favorite.

Doesn't bother me. I don't understand losing all perspective because Kentucky won't have an easy road. When is it ever an easy road? We probably needed Kendall Marshall to be injured in 2012, and even then we had to run an ungodly gauntlet full of traditional rivals through the NCAA Tournament.

It's never easy. All you hope as a fan is that you have the personnel to be in the mix. If you're in the mix enough, you'll win the whole thing eventually. With as strong as this recruiting class and with as many to players as we're in on next year, you just hope Kentucky is in the mix. That's all you can ask for. Because for so many years before Cal, we weren't in the mix.

Yeah, it would be better if we had four-year guys who we watched grow, who came along, matured, gave us some experience. But other programs have had those four-year guys and haven't done anything in the postseason during those players' careers. Powerhouse programs like Kansas. So nothing is foolproof. Everything is hard and unpredictable in this game.

The thing about Duke though is who is their PG???

If the rumors are true and Thornton is pushed out to make room for Bolden and Allen coming back, I don't know who it is...

[Joneslab]

^ Probably Frank Jackson.

I'm not sure it will matter as they're going to be so good at other positions.

[lilproUK98]

^ Probably Frank Jackson.

I'm not sure it will matter as they're going to be so good at other positions.

As we learned in 2015 though, you can only play 5 at a time. My question is will they have someone who can control the game pace and.lead on the floor when they get challenged. I'm not sure they will have one like that if Thornton is gone.

And, five on five, I like our chances....

And another thing. There is no guarantee we even play them next year. A one game scenario in the tournament is just that. So bring em on, toss it up, and may the better team that night win...

[Joneslab]

I think a Final Four season is a success.

Actually for me I think it's even more simple than this.

I think you connect for whatever reason with certain teams. Sometimes it's because they're really good; sometimes it's just because you had a lot of fun following them.

I think most of us connected with the 2009 team, even though they were beaten in the Elite Eight. I connected big-time with Tubby Smith's three very good teams in the mid-2000s. None saw a Final Four. Actually the Suffocats are probably my favorite UK team of all time, including the championship teams. It doesn't make sense but there it is.

So sometimes it's not even about the postseason but the ride to get there.

[KevinHall]

^ You are tight about that connection. Some of mine are teams that didn't make the Final Four. 1986,Eddie Sutton's first team and those three Tubby teams you mentioned. Also throw in 1992 and even 1990, Pitino's first team that only went 13-13. A lot of it is about how much fun you had following them. I think because of the one and done aspect of Calipari's teams I haven't had as much fun. There seems to always be an emptiness to the end of the season. Even in 2012 when you knew all of them would be leaving.

[Matt Dillon]

To put the degree of difficulty in winning a NC in perspective, Rupp won his last one in 1958. It would be 20 years before we would win another, then 18 years before the next one. After a one year hiatus, we won another, and then it was 14 years before we won another one. All of this from one of the premier teams in college bb.

[Joneslab]

I can't say I "don't care" that they leave, but I definitely have as much fun.

I think--and I've said this before--that because we know so much more about them now that we connect far more to them. They burn really bright, partly because of their talent but also because of how Cal manipulates the information cycle.

Sheray Thomas was a four-year player. I daresay that all of us connected more to Anthony Davis than Sheray. There've been very good four-year players that are almost totally forgotten: Keith Bogans comes immediately to mind. I probably connected to Jamal Murray just as much. He was a hellacious talent for one, but I think we get so involved with these teams now in ways that we didn't used to.

All of us would rather there be four-year--or heck, even more two-year--players at Kentucky. But we've seen that here and the criticism after seasons was over was way, way louder.

[George]

I hesitate to say this, but does it seem to anyone else like other programs are a bit more fortuitous from season to season in their roster continuity, while still managing to bring in top recruiting classes?

Like I said, I hesitated to even say that, because as I sit here counting the Calipari players who've stayed, we appear on paper to have maybe been more fortunate than some of us realize: in order, we've had Jones and Lamb; Wiltjer; WCS and Poythress; Harrisons, WCS, Poythress and Lee; Poythress, Lee and Ulis. Is that all? We also (usually) get better recruits than other teams to fill in the gaps when players leave.

But, there's a feeling, a perception - possibly a reality? - that the other guys - Duke, Kansas, UNC, MSU - manage to maintain a consistent mix in a way that we don't necessarily pull off from season to season. Duke lost a ton after last season, but for them that's an aberration; for us, that's every other year. I guess it just feels like the peaks and valleys are more extreme for us than any other program, and that because of those extremes it's even harder for us to build a complete team.

Then, when draft time rolls around, it's a shock if our guys don't go. Put Grayson Allen in a UK uniform and the kid probably would've left after his championship performance as a freshman. At Duke? See you at senior day.

In the end, I guess it doesn't really matter. The end results are usually the same and like someone else said above (or in another thread, maybe) we're in the mix same as the rest of those guys. But, I like to think that if we could pull of a little more of that continuity, we'd have a couple more championships, and possibly more on the way. I think that's what stings the most about it all.

Forgive the rambling nature of this post. I was sort of thinking this whole thing through as I wrote.