John Calipari raves about Travis Perry's state title win, love for Kentucky: "I couldn't be more proud"

Travis Perry‘s historic high school basketball career has come to a bittersweet end — bitter only because it’s over. You can’t write a better story for a homegrown Kentucky talent, becoming the state’s all-time leading scorer with 5,481 career points while earning Mr. Basketball and Gatorade Player of the Year. And then to put cap it off, he helped lead Lyon County to a state championship this past weekend, defeating Harlan County in the finals by a final score of 67-58.

Everything he could have accomplished at the high school level, he was able to. Perry gave it everything he had, all the way through the finish line. And he goes out a champion.

“We were talking earlier in the week, like what are we gonna do if we actually win?” Perry said following the win. “I felt like I was gonna cry. I feel like I could cry happy tears, but I just can’t. It’s so exciting.”

His future head coach wasn’t in attendance, but he saw how things unfolded and knows what he did to will his team to victory. And he’s excited to see those abilities translate in the same building he earned the state title trophy, Rupp Arena.

“For Lyon County, that has 277 students, to win the state championship? Are you kidding me?” John Calipari said Monday evening. “I told Ryan (Perry), Travis’ dad who coached the team, ‘What an accomplishment.’ He’s had that team together since they were 7th and 8th graders, they just stayed together. He’s got a gym on his property.

“For Travis, to do what he did, as a young player — he was a gamer. Everybody was calling me. I wasn’t at the game, but he and I talked after, I texted with his dad after.”

Calipari compared Perry’s situation to Reed Sheppard and how he embraced being a Kentuckian and understood just what basketball means to this state at every level. It meant something to cut down the nets inside Rupp Arena, just as it means something to wear Kentucky across his chest at the next level.

Sheppard paved the path for stardom in Lexington as an in-state signee and Calipari hopes Perry follows in his footsteps.

The kid does know how to win, after all.

“I couldn’t be more proud and I’m happy that his desire, just like Reed’s, was to play Kentucky,” he said of Perry. “Again, a lot of players, they’re coming here because of what the future holds, but so are Reed and Travis. They are too. They have a special place in their heart for this state and this program.”

Maybe they decide to suit up and play together next season? That’s certainly what Big Blue Nation is rooting for.