I have been to Kansas and there is NOTHING there. I will say their fans (old or young) are into the game and make it a special environment to play in. I have been to Arizona and I think that campus is a dump.
Holt. Rippey. Stokes. Muurinen
- Thread starter Jkr21790
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It’s every excuse but the most obvious one: Pope and his current staff are simply unable to recruit elite talent.It’s the campus life and area. There’s much more to see and do in other states. That’s what the kids are saying
Fans were concerned when he was first hired due to his lack of experience recruiting in the upper echelons of college basketball and it’s becoming all the more obvious with each passing day. Every other excuse is just a coping mechanism by fans unwilling to accept this reality.
Pope needs to seriously reconsider how he approaches recruitment. And this includes revamping the staff and looking for assistant coaches who are capable of landing the big recruits and transfers he’s promised. If he refuses then he isn’t as serious about Kentucky basketball as we all thought. Loyalty to coaches has ended many a coaching tenures in college sports, we’ve seen similarly in the past from former Kentucky coaches.
I see this as his first real HS class. He was so late to the party last season, he really did an amazing job of assembling a team that could make it to the sweet 16. RR always moves the goal posts. When he got here and inherited nothing from the gutted roster Cal left, most everyone on here thought that if he could assemble a team that could go .500 in the SEC and sneak into the tournament, it would be a GREAT success. He exceeded all that, and now we have folks killing his HS recruiting on Nov 17th and some saying we should expect a Final Four based on the fact that we (allegedly) spent $22 Million, which I highly doubt. Its so unrealistic it would be funny if the folks saying it weren't serious
Love Pope but I’m not gonna give him 5 years to figure it out.
Have to always say Love Pope before I say anything about him on here because the crew will get me and say I’m just a hater or Cal boy.
Believe me, this board has changed websites a number of times but nothing has changed, I heard the same excuses when Gillespie was coach and everyone not super positive about the tenure was accused of being a Tubby sycophant.
Pope is obviously not BCG. But he did have two 10-loss seasons in his short tenure. Pope can’t afford to do that, especially not with the amount of money being thrown around.
I criticize Pope hard. But it’s because I do think he will start doing the things I would like to see. I do think he will start landing a top five target every year. I do think he will win big. I do think he will get some fire behind him. I do think he will win a championship.
Holt said in interviews a month ago that he wants to be the main guy and not play with other 5 stars or players that will need the ball . HELLO, thats the type of thing Pope backs away from when hears that from a recruit and we know this because he has talked about getting players with the right mind set. Team first and sharing the ball is what he means.
The staff said you'd be shocked in who they backed away from because they werent the right fit. I guarantee you if Holt was serious about what he said , Pope would back away.
When Holt said that , all of you should have known for 100% sure we were not getting Holt.
Most elite talent are me first players and care about their careers more than winning so it was always going to be rare and hard for Pope to land Elite HS players. You will just have to accept his philosophy and many fans wants dont align, hell many fans wants dont align with how teams have won titles the past 10 years. Pope's style and his success will depend on if he can develop really good players into elite (NCAA Elite, not NBA elite) players.
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Agree. And unfortunately I think that’s where we’re headed.
Gotta start closing on these recruits! Seriously, wtf are we doing…smh
They just can't close!
Rippey is not even close, we are even not a hat on the table... Pope can not recruit
I’m definitely getting concerned about recruiting!
ur just now getting concerned? dent lewis or wilson didnt do it for you?
Don’t worry we will get a junior or senior point guard that has no choice but to be in college with a broke down body. Will be injured before the season starts and then we will play our two guard at the one.
Can’t even make the top five? Oh yea Pope moved on from him because he wanted to showcase his talents and not play down to the level of other players in a system.
Never expected Rippey here with Lowe almost guaranteed to be our starting PG next year.
I don't understand the Pope can't recruit crowd.
He landed 2 5 star guys in Moreno and Johnson. Got Lowe who many on here thought was the best PG transfer (or at least one of the best).
Make up your mind - he gets good players or he doesn't.
He landed 2 5 star guys in Moreno and Johnson. Got Lowe who many on here thought was the best PG transfer (or at least one of the best).
Make up your mind - he gets good players or he doesn't.
well moreno and jj are 4 stars lol
his first 2 years here have been:
2 3 stars
3 4 stars
Sr Lowe and Soph Johnson. Rippey was never going to come here unless he was a starter and Pope doesnt want a freshman starting PG anyways
So Holt and Rippey are done, no telling on Stokes now. I felt 2026 would be the class we started seeing our recruiting take off and it’s been whiff city in all our big targets so far. Not too many left honestly. Very concerning after a good first year and top notch NIL.
I wonder if JJ and Moreno are not in-state players, would they commit for us?
Then we better cut ties with Lowe because A.) he hasn’t set the world on fire here and B.) he seems to be made of glass. We can’t afford to rely on a guy to run our team who can’t play defense and can’t play at all because he’s hurt.
Yes, it is concerning
If Pope can not get top talent in portal or high school, s16 will be his ceiling and this screams a lesser Tubby to me.
I’m so glad you pointed that out. I didn’t want to be the guy to do it lol
He gets good players. He has a team full of good players. We want him to land one or two great players so we can go from blending in with the crowd to being Kentucky. If I wanted average expectations I would go cheer for Louisville or somebody.
Mediocre don’t cut it here.
Edit. I gotta add my patience is gone because of Cal. It’s not Popes fault that Cal toyed with the program the last five years.
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before Cal, we rarely landed the great top 10 players out of HS. Pope lands Stokes or Collins and his recruiting is pretty much in line with our entire history outside of the 15 Cal years recruiting wise.
He does that I’ll shut the hell up lol
If Pope can only get good players but never get great players here, he will be fired eventually because S16 will be his ceiling (with probably multiple early round choking)...
First year is ok for Kentucky standard, but we need great.
You should add that if he cant do that or if he cant develop players into great players. Because coaches like Golden, Hurley, Oats, etc developed players into being really great. Pope has to do one or the other or both or you are right he wont last here
It is probably not because of assistance coach, it may because Mark Pope is not good recruiter
Idk about that but we should get rid of Fox. Maybe he’s valuable but every time I see him it reminds me of a retired Grandpa just taking it easy at his buddies gig. I want hungry coaches.
I always thought about this
What things do he contribute make him irreplaceable? Recruit? Offense coaching? Defense Coaching? NIL negotiation?
At least other four had show some merits in some part
But what is Mark Fox good at?
Golden, and Hurley do not need five stars to win big
They can find athletic and smart guys from lesser ranked pool
Can Pope do it? It will be pretty hard, and this is the reason Golden and Hurley are best of the best
golden and hurley also had the best non freshman those years too
They do not need to get the "best ranked" player from pottal
But they have their eyes for evaluation and have ability to develop players
They can find smart, competitive, physical players from lesser ranked pool
(Also Hurley can recruit great now, get five stars constantly)