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John Calipari is expected to be the next head coach at the University of Arkansas, and the University of Kentucky needs a new men's basketball coach. As hasty as the last one was to relinquish the post after recent postseason failures, how quickly future candidates will run toward Lexington. probably.
Five different men won national championships there. The Kentucky Jockeys join Kansas State as the winningest programs in history. There, there is no limit to the coach's wins, so there is no upper limit.
Of course, expectations and monitoring are not for the anxious or faint of heart. But for many, the turnaround may be too great to resist.
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John Calipari is lost. Will he and Kentucky be able to find it again?
job evaluation
John Calipari was one of the two highest paid coaches in the country. Money should not be an issue in anything.
But in 2022, a public spat began between Calipari and athletic director Mitch Barnhart over the need for a new practice facility. Does Kentucky really need one? It may be in the eye of the beholder. The Craft Center he opened in 2007. Is it obsolete in the arms race of college athletics?
Name, image, and likeness operations are also worth considering. Kentucky made headlines last offseason by losing NIL ringleader TJ Beisner to North Carolina, but he has dramatically improved things in Chapel Hill. On March 14, Kentucky launched its NIL Initiative with a $1 million goal. In less than a month, the cash register had about $50,000 in it.
And, of course, Kentucky is in the SEC. Coaching in one of the two conferences that will shape the future of all sports is a pretty secure position.
Call list (alphabetically)
Billy Donovan, Chicago Bulls head coach: He's been a Kentucky fan's dream candidate ever since…ah, 2007. Donovan is Rick He was an assistant at Kentucky under Pitino and doesn't have the baggage of his former boss. But will he leave the NBA and go to the Lexington fishbowl? Is he interested in returning to college? It seems unlikely, but Barnhart should at least make the call and get him to say no.
Scott Drew, Baylor head coach: Drew and UK AD Barnhart have been friendly since the 2021 NCAA Tournament bubble, where Barnhart was the selection committee chair and Baylor won. People familiar with Barnhart's thinking said Drew would be his first choice whenever the job opened up. Baylor's coach organized perhaps the greatest player in college basketball history. When Baylor took the job, he was on probation. Drew led the Bears to the NCAA Tournament in his fifth season. He has won two Big 12 titles and played in five consecutive tournaments. He is one of the top recruiters in the sports industry. Baylor has had a lottery pick the past two years and is expected to have a lottery pick again this year. Baylor just went through this with Drew, who was also the top pick at Louisville. Baylor and Drew recently agreed to terms on a new contract, according to a person briefed on the matter.
Sean Miller, Xavier Head Coach: Is this an easy sell or a hard sell for Kentucky? They were plagued by injuries last season and struggled to 16 wins and 18 losses. He never made it to the Final Four. However, he has won 71.6% of his matches and is able to utilize all of the program's resources in the right direction. And perhaps he'll say yes right away, eyeing a level of success he never had in Arizona.
Nate Oats, University of Alabama head coach: This may make the most sense, but an $18 million acquisition requires some seismic belief. Oats could be valuable to Kentucky. In five years at Alabama, the 49-year-old has a 62-28 record in the SEC, two league championships and four NCAA Tournament appearances. He has reached his Sweet 16 trip twice so far and made the ultimate statement this year with a trip to the Final Four. Not only does Oats win, but his style of play will have Cats fans drooling. High pace, high pressure, 3 point focus. Oats had already proven he could recruit and produce professionals at the level needed in Lexington. In theory, what he's already accomplished at Alabama is what he's expected to do at Kentucky.
Bruce Pearl, Auburn head coach: We've long heard that Coach Barnhart has no interest in hiring someone who served three years for an NCAA show-cause penalty, but he's one of the SEC coaches who accomplished more with less money than Calipari. I am alone. He won the SEC regular season in 2018 and 2022 and the league tournament in 2019 and 2024. He has been to the Final Four more recently than Kentucky (his only one so far at Auburn). So if many of these other candidates say no, Mr. Pearl's past missteps may suddenly become less unpleasant for Mr. Barnhart. In terms of personality, Pearl is the perfect fit for Carnival Barking.
Rick Pitino, St. John's head coach: This will undoubtedly be the most incredible outcome of an already incredible event. But it's also a scenario that needs to be considered, even if it's completely unlikely. Pitino won more than 80 percent of his matches during a legendary tenure at Kentucky, including the 1996 national title, and remains perhaps the most loved and hated man in the state. Pitino would definitely win if he returned to Lexington, but he's 71 years old and it's seriously hard to imagine this being a realistic option. That being said, Pitino is still coaching and the job is open, so how great would this reunion be? Pitino has reinvigorated his dormant St. John's this past year and has been an absolute force of nature, not only in financing programs, but also in financing fame, image, and licenses. . Despite his age, he has not slowed down at all, and his career almost failed many times. Will Kentucky be open to that idea?
BYU Head Coach Mark Pope: Will my ex-son come back? Yes, it will play. Pope was a member of Rick Pitino's 1995-96 national championship team in Lexington and has long been rumored as a possible successor to Calipari precisely because of his background. Of course, stepping into a job of this magnitude requires more than just a fun story. And in that regard, Pope significantly expanded his own eligibility this season, leading BYU to his 23-win season and earning his NCAA Tournament berth, the program's first. Pope ran a great offense, and the Cougars finished 14th in the nation in adjusted offensive efficiency this season, according to KenPom. He has now been to the NCAA Tournament twice in five seasons, and probably would have made it to the third in 2020. The NCAA Tournament was not canceled due to the coronavirus pandemic. His two big questions here are: 1) Pope's acquisition. BYU is not known as it is private (but likely not outrageous). 2) Pope has never won his NCAA Tournament game. Will Kentucky, one of the few win-or-break programs in the country, put that much faith in a player who hasn't won the Big Dance?
Kelvin Sampson, Houston Head Coach: He turns 69 in October. He was also named AP Coach of the Year. It makes sense: Sampson wants to take one grand slam swing at a U.S. championship before retiring, leaving his son Kellen with enough talent to succeed him.
Shaka Smart, Marquette Head Coach: Smart's reps have made it perfectly clear that he has no interest in any of the high-profile openings earlier in this cycle, and none of those openings were at Kentucky. The easy counterargument to this is that Smart has already spent his life working a high-profile job at a major state school and it just didn't work out. But the jobs in Texas and Kentucky are not similar.Kentucky is a basketball school – probably of Basketball School — and is on par with the market in all steroids available. We wonder if Smart would be interested in upending his life in the most dramatic way possible, but when the call comes, at least he has to answer, right? Or?
And the recruitment…
Donovan is the top option here, and if you're going to make that level of a call, you should at least reach out to Drew (and probably Dan Hurley as well, but if he leaves Connecticut Although the chances are basically zero). But Baylor just reworked Drew's contract, not to mention the program's shiny new arena, Foster Pavilion, which opened in January. What if they fail? Oats, who has surpassed Calipari in the SEC pecking order the past few seasons, will definitely get the call and is as close to the ideal hire as Cats fans could hope for at this point in the coaching merry-go-round.
(Photo: Justin Ford/Getty Images)