If he doesn’t resign knowing he just had one of the worst tournament losses in Kentucky basketball history and no recruits going into next year, then he isn’t the man I thought he was.
Pope lacks integrity
- Thread starter FatCatMan
- Start date
Losing to Oakland and St Peters are by far the worst given what UK had.
Yes and a Hall of Fame coach walked away when it was time. From Pope’s own comments when he took the job, he doesn’t deserve a lame duck year 3.
Next season is going to be worse. We'll have to dip into the D2 portal pool to scrap together a team made of guys making 2m+ as Pope's reputation conutines to implode while Stokes and the rest of Kansas laughs their way to another ship.
Guys, Pope is going to be back next year. I hate it. We all hate it but, Barnhart ain't firing anyone on his way out the door.
Yeah calling it worse than Oakland and St. peter’s is hyperbole. We got smoked by like 20 by Kansas in the 2nd round one of Tubby’s last years too.
If I had to rank tourney losses in terms of “wow that was bad” post probation id go
1 St. peter’s (2022)
2 Oakland (2024)
3 UAB (2004)
4 Kansas State (2018)
5 Iowa State (2026)
But last years Tennessee game wouldn’t be far behind this one either.
If I had to rank tourney losses in terms of “wow that was bad” post probation id go
1 St. peter’s (2022)
2 Oakland (2024)
3 UAB (2004)
4 Kansas State (2018)
5 Iowa State (2026)
But last years Tennessee game wouldn’t be far behind this one either.
If Pope doesn’t quit, despite everything going against him, then he doesn’t care about this program. He cares about the money.
Kansas isn’t winning anything. They have underachieved just as much uk the last 2 years. Doesn’t matter if stokes goes there or not.
Y'all losers have nothing better than whining. You'll be whining for another year. Cal had 40 first round picks here and only one championship. You never know what pope can do with recruiting portal. This year was a loss, but y'all can go root for Louisville or Arkansas next year.
You commenting on anyone’s integrity is laughable. Truly. Go away phony.
Aaaaand then he was out. Pope has set a lot of bad records at Kentucky. This is one of the worst tournament losses I’ve seen. And Calipari wasn’t paying MILLIONS OF DOLLRS to recruit.
Stop, you sound ridiculous going around defending the indefensible. Calipari also won, 4 final fours sec titles elite 8’s championship games a championship. Just log off.
We continue to take this stuff out of context. And I don’t remember the Kansas game, I remember losing by like 10. We were picked there too, it wasn’t all bad. This is ALL bad.
Tubby and Calipari had a lot of success at Kentucky. Mark has never had success in his whole life coaching basketball. Neither of those coaches were paying players. Mark is given more than anyone in the country and STILL sets all time horrible records.
Context. Matters. In. Life. I just feel like people say these things and leave all the context out of it.
Tubby won a title. Any coach that wins a title automatically gets a pass from "worst ever."
You jackasses guess what the only two coaches that took us to the nit or worse in 30 plus years was Billy g and cal. Cal only won 9 games. A loss is a loss regardless of by how much. Sometimes you have bad luck this year injuries and lack of recruiting a back up pg and the jq thing didn't pan out. I wonder why we don't get players the way y'all run your mouth.
.
Hurley said no
Oats said no
Bayor coach said no
Y'all guys were making fun of dusty may as a hire at first. Keeping cal as long as we did screwed us and now y'all won't give a coach 3 years, it's evident we have pretty bad luck with players too.
.
Hurley said no
Oats said no
Bayor coach said no
Y'all guys were making fun of dusty may as a hire at first. Keeping cal as long as we did screwed us and now y'all won't give a coach 3 years, it's evident we have pretty bad luck with players too.
Calipari DID NOT "walk away." He foolishly, and maybe unintentionally, breached his contract with UK by talking with Arkansas about their job without giving UK notice as required in the contract. To his eternal credit, Mitch jumped on the situation like a duck on a junebug, because Mitch wanted Calipari gone just like I did. So Mitch told Calipari, privately ... "Look John, you breached the contract. I can fire you for 'cause' and avoid paying you any buyout. Now, we can do this the hard way and everybody "lawyer up", or you can just say, 'I've decided to resign from the UK job and take the Arkansas job.' " And that's what Calipari did. But you can bet your life that Calipari didn't WANT to lose that buy-out bonanza. Mitch had Calipari by the balls with a downhill drag, and they both knew it. Ergo, Calipari leaves with no $50 million buyout.
Why would he resign? If anything he should ask for a raise.
Back to back 20 win seasons and NCAA tourney appearances is success in anyone's book.
Back to back 20 win seasons and NCAA tourney appearances is success in anyone's book.
Are you crazy. We just lost to a team that lost their best player two days ago. Everyone knows how hard it is to win with an injury!
I am sorry, but St Peter's is not the top. They might not have a basketball name, but that was a good team and they confirmed it by going to the Elite Eight. You must be not know Kentucky history very well. Middle Tennessee deserves on that list.
Post probation
Edit: Also. st. peter’s eventually got DRILLED by a unc team we clobbered earlier in the year. And we lost to them with the national PoY on the roster and two first round picks. We were a 2 seed and lost to a 15.
We played like crap today. And once again Pope coughed up a lead by subbing in a guy that has a -1000 +/- for the season. But we were underdogs even accounting for the injured. Iowa State was the far better team all season and were today as well. I never expected to win this game.
Now if you wanna talk all time disappointing seasons? Oh yeah this is way up there. But this is nowhere near the worst tourney loss. We were a 7 seed and made the second round as expected. Just a big fat “meh”.
Last edited:
Exactly. Were those 2 seeds? Some of our fans are on crack.
Why in the world would he quit. They hired him in good faith. If it was a bad hire, UK needs to take its medicine.
The one poster is a massive Calipari apologist. I suspect thats the only reason some of them are spouting that nonsense. That St. peter’s game is probably Calipari’s worse game as a coach in his career.
Losing to a 15 as a 2 with the NPoY and two other first round picks on the roster AND a 2000 point college scorer is infinitely worse than losing to a 2 seed as a 7 in the second round even with them being down a key player. We were UNDERDOGS today. THAT is the problem.
This guy probably sits around at night with his inner circle and talks about this is all just a "test" and that they have to "dig deep."
Does Pope not realize that Kentucky is not a place where you search for your inner voice?
Win or get the hell out. It's as simple as that.
How many on this board would resign from a $5 million salary and an additional $20 million severance? NOT a single one of US. Why we all think Pope is that dumb?
So it is about the money. If he thinks money is bigger than our program, then where’s the integrity? He’s already a millionaire and set for life. Why does he need more? Jim Harbaugh took a salary cut when he wasn’t performing up to snuff at Michigan and he was a CHEATER.
What year did we lose? The Marquette in the second round were first or second see 93 or 94 maybe? That needs to go on the list.
What’s bad is we all don’t hate it. The administration and a large segment of this fan base wants to continue whatever you want to call this!
Oakland had a player shoot out of his mind and St Peter's made a miracle run to the E8. We just got ran out of the gym by a team missing their best player and they didn't play a pretty good first half.