KSR - 2024-04-15- KSR - Hour 2

Episode Date: April 15, 2024

Matt, Ryan, Drew, and Shannon talk the beginning of the Mark Pope era for Kentucky Basketball.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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by going to Stockton.com and get started. I've even used Stockton Mortgage myself on my own home loan. your home loan needs stockton dot com and click get started stockton mortgage nmLS 8259 equal housing lender nmLS consumer access dot org welcome to hour two of kentucky sports radio presented by stockton mortgage now here's matt jones welcome back hour number two here kentucky sports radio k s bar and grill about to open up got a great crowd from all over joining us uh on a celebration day they They compared it to a revival yesterday. You agree with that?

It was kind of a revival of sorts. Like you used the word reawakening. It's like we got our mojo back as a fan. We felt like we were back as part of the program again. It's a little bit of a family reunion too, you know. Some fans might have stepped out for a bit. We all saw each other again, had a big hug and Ruff Arena. Now we're ready to move forward together.

So let's go over some questions I got on the text machine. One person writes, Matt, he did say Shepard. Do we think we get Reed Shepard back? No. I do not. I think we need to just assume he will not be back. I think, you know, if it happens, that's great. But I think he is gone.

And my guess is if he's gone, he'll announce pretty soon. I don't think you want to let that sort of, you just don't want to let people continue to think. Look, again, I hope I'm wrong. I hope that ends up not being the case, but that's where I think we are. And, you know, Reed's the type of guy, if he goes pro, he's still going to be one of us. And he's still anything Mark Pope would ask him to do, Reed will be the first to step in line to do it with for this program. One person writes, Matt, do you think we will have a lot of young freshmen or are we going

to be old this year? I think we're going to be really old. I think we might get, I think they're going to go really, really hard on one top freshmen. And maybe they'll find another one that I don't know. You got Travis Perry. I think they're going to be going really, really hard on a top freshman. We'll see how it goes.

But I think we're going to be very old this year. Now, I think after that, they're going to co-try try to get really good freshmen, but it's just so late in the process, and he only had one guy committed to BYU. Now, that guy's awesome, so that's going to be part of the question, but that guy's awesome. I also want to tell you something, again, this was interesting to me that I hadn't thought about. I had a guy who I know through another business thing who is a, who's Mormon. And he is a donor to BYU. And he contacted me and said, hey, I just wanted to tell you, I'm really excited for Mark Pope. And I said, well, that's interesting.

I thought you'd be disappointed that he's coming. And he said, no. He said, in the Mormon church, we believe in missions. and he said, we sort of see this as he now has a mission to be at this very high profile job. I found that to be very interesting. And I said, well, that's interesting. He goes, also, we're going to want Mormon, really good Mormon players to go there because it would be a mission for them to be on that profile. That's just an interesting thought to me.

I mean, I don't, he wasn't speaking for Mark Pope. he wasn't speaking for any recruit. But that was just a mindset that I wouldn't have thought that maybe is there, Ryan, with some of those folks that maybe wouldn't be with a different kind of place. Interesting to hear that. You know, something I guess, you know, we don't think of things like that. But yeah, I can see where he's coming from. They're proud of him.

He's one of them. Now you want him to succeed here. But there is a top 30 player from two years ago, whose name is, I think, Connor something, that committed to BYU and then had a two-year mission trip to Sierra Leone. owned. And now we'll come play college basketball. It'll be interesting to see, Drew, does he go to BYU, or does he follow the coach that recruited him here? I don't know. He'd be a heck of an addition, a 20-year-old that can play. Well, he should certainly consider the bigger mission at hand here in

Lexington. And really, if any of them can shoot the three, defend, if there's any Jimmer Ferdettes or Danny Aangis out there, got plenty of room for you to continue your mission in Lexington. There's your mission. What a mission that it would be. One person writes, Matt, I want to know who this big assistant is. Can you tell me? I can't. But if he's coming here, we'll probably know by tomorrow. Okay.

And if he's not, then they'll go in another direction. But remember, some of the best assistants, like, unless you're really in the college basketball world, you don't know who the assistant coaches are. So, like, there'll be a name pop up that may end up here. Ryan, we may not know who it is, but it's a great hire, you know? Yeah, there's been coaches that, Coach Cal brought in. I didn't know who they were until they got here.

So I'm sure we'll have the same thing. Yeah. 859-28027. Who's up next? Nick. Nick. Nick. Hey, what's up, guys?

So one of the things that kind of caught me off guard was Drew's face when you got the ovation. They were up. So Drew, one, were you truly surprised? Oh, yeah. Okay. And very happy for them. Is it because the Internet? It's because everybody just kind of dogs on the Internet?

or what was the reasoning of your surprise? The surprise for the turnout? No, he made a product. No, the surprise for Matt's ovation. Yeah. If you saw it on your face, like you were genuinely like, oh shit, okay, Matt, all right. Oh, gosh, we can't let you guys.

I appreciate the call. Go ahead. Well, I mean, at press conferences, you don't normally get a reaction anytime someone introduces themselves. Well, that was the thing. It's not that I thought anyone had any kind of opinion either way. I just didn't expect a cheer for, you know, asking a question. And that was a big cheer.

My laugh was, I wasn't mocking about it. Kind of knee in him. a little bit. But no, I was generally happy for him, and I was surprised that the place roared when you got the microphone. I will say what was cool on a personal level, there's that picture of me and Mario and Maggie all taking a picture of the crowd together. But I looked around yesterday, and I did have a moment where, you know, after COVID, we don't all get together like we used to in the media. You know what I mean, Ryan? Like, it used to be at games. The whole media came to everything. Part of it, to be quite frank with you, was Cal never said anything ever,

so the press conferences became a waste of time, to be quite honest with you. And the assistants did most of them. And the assistants did them. It just wasn't worth going. I hadn't been to a press conference in four years because it just wasn't worth it. He never said anything and it just wasn't interesting. So yesterday was for, in some ways, like, I saw people I haven't seen in four years, right? And so that was cool. But then I looked around, and we had Drew, Ryan, Tyler, Zach, one of our new guys, Phoenix, Jack, Jacob. Then you had Maggie Davis over there doing the television, Stephen, Mario. There's another kid who's his name is escaping me, but now he works for another television station as well.

I counted 12 people that had either had worked for KSR or were working for KSR now, all in the same place. And I'm sitting here thinking like these media jobs are all being filled by people who started with me as an intern. I actually, right, got a little emotional at that. I'm not going to lie to you. Well, you just see how far, you know, KSR is growing. It's kind of cool. I do want to mention I think it was kind of a cool moment with Pope with Alan Cutler when he kind of said, hey, that was neat.

That's my guy. And by the way, you were in a bunch of those videos, like running. The game was on the big screen with all the videos when Mark Pope played. There was Ryan Lemon all over the place. Are you excited to seem because you all knew each other really well? Well, like I said, that 96 team, that's my rock star team. You refer to the Cowell's first team is kind of your rock star team. Those are the guys that I was starstruck by most of the time I was here

because I just got here right when they made that run. And you know, you let me say on Friday, Mark Pope is just one of the nicest, most charismatic, approachable dudes I was ever around. He just, you're drawn to him. And I think that's what's going to help him as a recruiter. You know, he goes into mom's kitchen, and the mom's going to be drawn to him because he's just such a good guy. So that means when he comes on the show, you're going to be the one that knows him. You're going to be the one budding up to him.

We went to the Memphis to the SEC tournament that year, and he was part of our crew, and then they went to Salt Lake City in California. I didn't go on those two legs, but then they came back for Indianapolis for the Final Four, and that's where we were together, like, a lot up there at the 97 final. Also, a lot of America learned that Alan Cutler looks like Jerry Garcia. Like a lot of people hadn't seen him since he was on TV. They were like, when did he be in near to the Grateful Dad concert? I'm looking forward to that stage of my media career.

I'm not quite there yet, but when you just don't care anymore? This is just me. This is what I am today. This is what I am. So it's going to be. Who's next? Chris. Chris, go ahead, Chris.

Yeah, guys. Hey, thanks for having me on two comments and questions. So first of all, with regard to the comments. I see people who want to be critical of our hiring of Mark Pope and making the issue that, hey, he was your third or fourth choice on your list and as if that somehow invalidates his hiring. And I just want to mention that we have a principal in our hiring in our company that says that sometimes your first choice is not your best choice. No, that's exactly right. Rick Petino, just so you know, Rick Petino was the third choice.

When John Caliperi was hired, I think there's a decent. an argument that in Mitch's mind, Cal was the third choice. Billy Donovan and Tom Izzo both canceled their interviews. So the last two times we got a third choice, it was pretty awesome. And I feel very confident that Mark Pope was the third choice. So we have a pretty good, we have a pretty good record on third choices. But that's not something to be, you know, shame. Oh, hey, we didn't really get what we wanted here. Sometimes you get more than what you wanted when you drop down the list. If you can find out that's what you really needed.

So anyway, that's my first thing. Rolling Stone said that, didn't they, Shannon? You can't always get what you want, but you find sometimes you get what you need. That's exactly right. Secondly, I want to make the point that in order to be pro-Pope, you don't have anti-Cow. I agree with that. So I think it's fine for some of us that kind of wrestle with that a bit, you know, that appreciate the great things that Cal did because he did do a lot of great things for many

years and I don't think you have to turn on the good that CalProt in order to be pro-Pope. Let's recognize and acknowledge we were riding high for seven years. I totally agree. Let me go on that for me. I appreciate the call because I do think you've made two really good points. Point one, over the next couple months, we're going to, it's just going to be natural until I go to Europe. We're going to be talking about some of the end of the Cal era. I want to be clear in the course of those six weeks of conversation. I want to talk factually about. what happened and what some of the problems were, but I'm not dogging him. For 10 years, he was awesome here. And in the last four years, things didn't go well, and we need to talk about why.

But for 10 years, he was awesome. I will always be grateful for Cal, and being pro-Pope does not mean you have to be anti-Cal. You can be both of those things. You can be pro-Cal and believe it was time. I keep using the analogy of a relationship, but I've been in relationships. that ended, that I still value that relationship quite a bit because it was really good for a long time and it ends. That doesn't mean the substance of it wasn't good. The substance of the cow relationship was good. It was time for change. And now we're in a new relationship and we got to be all in.

But we're going to talk about some of that stuff down the road. But that doesn't mean that cow wasn't an overall positive. The second thing is I could give two blanks what anybody anywhere else says. about this high. I don't care. I don't care if the other fans mock it. I don't care if the other fans think it's awful. You know what? They all said Cal was a cheater when he came. They all said Cal couldn't win. They all said, I don't care what any of them say. Kentucky basketball is about what happened yesterday. And they'll all see, right? If we win, they'll tell them all to shut up. If we lose, so be it. But I don't care what any of them said. One of the things I realized last night is I was

seen some criticism from other fans. It seems like the national media kind of likes Mark Pope, But it reminds me when Cal was first here. Remember how the national media and fans would always attack him? And I really liked the role of being the defender. I mean, I would go at it with people. And I loved it. That was kind of what built a lot of mine in Cal's relationship. I loved being that defender.

Being that defender cost me a bunch of jobs, to be honest with you. But I love that role. Well, guess what? We're doing it again. All right? I'm all in on Mark Pope. I'm going to do whatever I can, and there's only so much I can do, but I'm going to do whatever I can to make this good.

And I'm going to be the one defending him in Kentucky basketball. And for everybody that says, oh, it's not really a blue blood. Arkansas is a blue blood too. Shut up. There's not another program in the country that could have gotten that turnout yesterday and that would have had that moment. So those people can shut their mouth, Ryan, because they are not us. Kentucky's on a different level when it comes to fan interaction and excitement.

Yeah, we saw the crowd that was at Calipar. introductory news conference at Arkansas. Which was fine, but it wasn't this. Wasn't this. We saw the championship celebration at Yukon. Which was fine, but it wasn't this. But it wasn't this. That's exactly right.

So it's just different here, it's special here, and we're all got that feeling that we're back, where we've got our program back. Yeah, you could fit about five or six of the Arkansas press conference in Roperini yesterday, not even counting all the people we had outside. It was just, as I said, to start the show. Yesterday was BBN flexing its muscles on everyone.

and showing that it's still the most powerful fan base. Tell me about Stockton Mortgage. Stockton Mortgage, you know, I think there may be a coach that's maybe coming into town that may need a place to live. You can't get on him about the mortgage thing. Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah, he, he needs.

It's a good time to buy, Matt. It's a great time to buy. For him it is, I think. It's the spring buying season. I'm sure he's got four daughters. He's going to need a big five-bedroom, four-bathroom house. We can help him find it, and he can get pre-approved through Stockton Mortgage. If there is a coach that's listening today, he should contact him.

tag Stockton Mortgage. You can apply online, Coach Pope, at Stockton.com, NMLS, 8259, Equal Housing Lender. I do want to say this. It would be remiss if we didn't note. There's another story that came out that I don't think you can just ignore, which is the story about the swim team. It's really not something that we can, like, what are you going to debate on radio? It's not a radio topic, in my opinion, but the allegations about the swim coach that were, that was at UK and the stuff happened, and then what happened with the university. That stuff is important stuff. And I encourage people that you should read the article.

It's not really a topic that's easy to do on sports radio. And I honestly have not looked into it enough to have like a strong opinion except to say the allegations about that coach are awful. And I feel terrible for the people that were involved both at this school and the other schools. I'm not, we're not trying to hide from it. It's terrible. It's absolutely terrible. And so, you know, but unfortunately it isn't really a topic you can do the nuance on on sports talk radio.

But it is absolutely awful, the athletic story. And God bless all the people who had to deal with all the stuff over the years. It's a terrible situation. We'll take a break. It'll be right back. It's Kentucky Sports Radio. There you go, Shannon. A little Rolling Stone.

You get what you need, right? That's right. Can't always do what you want. That's right. You can't always get what you want, but sometimes, you go. you get what you need. Text machine, one person writes, Matt, I saw you at Keenland. First of all, that jacket's much nicer than I've ever seen anything you wore.

Thank you very much. Would you wear your Trump jacket? Shut up. Don't try to bring down my vibe, okay? I was one of the ones that screamed Pope at you. So Saturday, I was at Keenland. I was in the clubhouse, but I walked to go see some friends in other places. And there were people everywhere.

I mean, if that wasn't the most people there, I'd like to know when the most people there were there. But everyone was screaming Mark Pope at me. Uh-huh. Like, just Pope, Pope, what do you think about Pope? And then a group of young guys were chanting P-O-P-E, Pope, Pope, Pope, Pope. That was like the first time I realized, you know what? Like, everybody's on board. Like, you know what, like, it was insane.

I didn't have one person say to me they didn't think he was going to do a good job, Drew. It was crazy. That was like the moment it hit me. Man, this place is like in. And that and obviously yesterday, a lot of people more nationally, I've Seth Davis, Andy Katz, or examples. It's like all that stuff we saw on Twitter. Twitter's just Twitter.

It is what it is. It's negative. The real fans and the real people are the ones yelling P-O-P-E, Pope, Pope, at Keenland and standing outside a Rupperina for a press conference four hours in advance in line. That's the real opinions and the real people that are going to be supporting Mark Pope. Yeah. Look, I don't think being skeptical of it was bad. If I was, then I was bad because I was skeptical of it.

But then, like, once it's happened, Ryan, it's happened. So now let's go. You know what I mean? Like, even if you, the other thing is, once I knew the details, I'm not going to say Barnhart didn't have any other choice. But, and I went over this on Friday. They had seven guys. Basically, six of them ended up telling them they weren't interested.

Billy Donovan, you have to wait, and he will not tell them that he definitely would take it. And he also said it was going to be until at least next weekend, so this coming weekend, before he would engage with him. All right, fair enough. So now you have to wait a week. And he still may say no. True. Okay. So then in the second tier, I think some folks higher-ups at UK say we're not talking to Beard, Miller, or Pearl.

All right. So three of the top five or six candidates, gone. Now you're down on the list to Pope, Tommy Floyd, Lloyd, Tommy Lloyd, and Shaka Smart. You look at that and go, well, why not the dude to win here? You know what I mean? Tommy Lloyd hasn't really won anything. Shaka has maybe more proof, but really hasn't won anything substantial.

So if you're at that level and Mark Pope's like, I'll walk there for this job. Drew, I can see why you'd pick him, right? Yeah. And really, at least where I was, it was the negativity was just the shock that it was hours after you throw the biggest bag ever at Hurley, that it was straight to Pope. It was like, was there not anything in between Hurley and Pope? But we learned, as you just said, there were some. They were just absolute nose. It was all that was just in a one day going Hurley to Pope that I think was so surprising.

But they knew. they got the no within Drew and Hurley within like six hours of each other. They had a plan, though, if they both tell us no, here's what we're doing. And, you know, they talked, I think, to Pope. I think they talked to Shaka. I'm not sure if they talked to Tommy Lloyd or not. But in that group, Mark Pope's not a crazy pick at that point, you know. This had come a fan base divided, and the move of Mark Pope has brought us all together.

with that. Talk about, I think that might be the most important thing. Wherever you were on Cal, pro or con, or in between, we were not united. This hire has united the fan base. And there's value in that, don't you think? Yeah. Sometimes things happen for a reason, you know, and the reason was to bring us all back together. And I think we all saw that and felt that yesterday 100%.

Who's up next? Let's go to David. David, go ahead, David. Hey, Matt. Hey, David. How are you? I'm fired up. I'm fired up for the Martin Pope area.

I also want to say something about the Cal to Coach Cal. I doubt he's listening, but I want to say I want to thank you for what he's done past 15 years. I agree with you, David. And I'm, and Coach Pope, I would, I like to thank you for, thank you for, for coming here and thank you for those critical free throws in the 1996 championship. He talked about those yesterday. He talked about those yesterday.

Well, David, it's good to hear from you. I hope you're excited about it. And I hope to see you here at the bar soon, okay? Okay. Appreciate the call. Go be blue. How about the story about the woman that called the postgame show yesterday? Did you all hear that?

Woman called from Knoxville, Tennessee. said they got in their car the night before and drove to get to the arena, slept in their car, and stood in line at 8.30 in the morning, so they'd be first in line. She said, I asked her, I said, did you get first in line so you could sit in the front row?

And she said, well, I'm in a wheelchair, so I couldn't sit in the front row, but I wanted my kids to sit in the front row. And she said, that was the best day of my life. Dude, that's what it's about. Yes, it is. I mean, that's what it's about. Like, that, that's what this is.

And I love that call because I think it is totally symbolic of what this place is. Like, it chokes me up just to think about it. You know what I mean? Like, that's, that's what it is. 859-28027. Do I have time for one more or no? No, we've got to hit a break here. All right.

Well, let's take a break here. We are here at the KS Bar and Grill. Come on out, have lunch. See Ryan and what's maybe the best collectively we've been dressing. in a while. I'm wearing the denim home whites. I've never worn these before. First time ever. We'll take a break. Be right back. KS.I. T.J. Smith, personal injury

attorney. Call T.J. He'll make them pay. Now, more of Kentucky Sports Radio presented by Stockton Mortgage. Here's Matt Jones. Welcome back. Tucky Sports Radio here at KS.S. By the way, Taylor Swift Trivia Thursday night. So tell all your friends, we have decided since apparently the Pope family are all Taylor Swift fans, we're going to try to see if we could get them to play Thursday night. I feel like that would be a good introduction to the UK fan base if we could get them here playing Taylor Swift trivia on Thursday night.

Yesterday I was walking towards them to invite them, and I got about four steps away and realized this is weird. I don't know them. I can't just approach these five women and invite them to go to the bar with me. But they should know trivia exists being swifties. If they decide to do it, I wouldn't be shocked if Mark joins him. He acts like he's as big of Taylor Swift fan as they are. That would be really cool.

We've just got to figure out how to make that, happen. I'm sure they're busy. They may not have time for, but the family might be able to do it. 859-280-2287. One person writes, Matt, do you think we will play Rick Petino? I don't know. What do you think? I think absolutely. I think that's coming. And I think now that time has worn off, Rick Patino will be welcome back, welcome to back. And I think Pope will make sure that it happens. I think it would be really, really good for them to do it. I think it would be cool. Now, here's the question. What happens when Cal comes next year? Now that all this is played out, the way it played out, what happens with Cal when he shows up

next year? I still think it'll depend on how Cal treats these next few months. He'll have plenty of times in front of a camera, and if there's any little shots thrown in our direction or any shade, I think he might get some aggressive booze. But I think it'll still be a welcoming reception. There'll be some, But I think most people don't have any animosity. They just knew it was time to try something new. You know, if he was like Tubby at High Point, I think we approach it differently. But he's at Arkansas, an SEC foe, and they're probably going to be really good. So I think we go after him, man.

You're the enemy now. But I mean, when you say go after him, do you think you boo him? Well, it would be a roar of booze? I think he gets booed. You think he gets booed? Yeah. He did leave. I mean, okay.

Okay, so let's put it. Let me do it a different way. If we played him tomorrow, would he get booed? I don't think so. I think people are a little sympathetic to how we're just all on fire celebrating Pope. And the man's still in town. Yeah. I'm going to say tomorrow he does not get booed if they do it.

There might be some booze, but I'd be surprised if he got booed. But I agree with Drew, it's going to depend on what happens between now and then. Like, what does he say? What does he do? like that's going to really matter because everything he says is going to be under a microscope. Yeah. And I think part of it's going to depend what happens. Do all of his dudes go down there?

Like I think DJ Wagner goes down there. I think Boogie Flan probably goes down there and Billy Richmond probably goes down there. But I'm not sure if everybody else is going to go down there. I think Jaden Quaidant might not. I think Somtoe may or may not. Bradshaw has already introduced. the portal and I don't think and there's a lot of whispers he's going to go to Ohio State so that's not down there we'll see what happens with Z. A do I do posted a picture from Lexington last

a do was in Lexington last night uh Mario looks like you don't think so you don't know what's going up Mario knows some of the players so I always look at his face with some of this happens to see but my point is I don't think they're all going to go and so some of them will go but I don't think they'll all go. So let me just put it like this. If he only gets a handful of those freshmen, well, then he better build it in the portal, which has not been his strength over the years, Ryan. So I don't know. I don't know what'll happen with him. A doo's the interesting one, because he actually entered the portal before all this even happened. A do was leaving. Yeah. But we don't, it'll be, it'll be interesting to see why Adu was leaving. Right. Because if a do were to consider staying here,

maybe that's not why he was leaving. Aaron Bradshaw was leaving no matter. or what. Like even if Cal came back. I think Wagner was going to come back here if Cal did. I don't know. I look at a do in Jordan Burks and who knows the Pope even wants them and how they fit in his system. But I think as crazy as it sounds, they stand to make more money than they would under Cal at Kentucky or Cal at Arkansas because Cal had so many guys ahead of them where UK could prioritize them and say, hey, come back, be the connection to last year. We'll take care of you with this new NIL pot that didn't exist last year. I think those two, should really consider UK because I think it would be better off.

If one of those guys came back, I think that would say a lot. If one of them, Adieu, Berks, Z, anybody. One of those dudes were to come back, I think that would be a really, really good side. I will say yesterday at the press conference, just so you know, Travis Perry was there. All the walk-ons were there, but they were the only ones there. So just so you know, so all the four walk-ons were there, but the rest of the players, at least I did not see them there. Not saying there weren't, but I don't think they were.

What's next? Let's go to Lucky. Lucky. Go ahead, Lucky. Thanks for taking a call, guys. Lady in the wheelchair is good segue, what my question is, with all the excitement and enthusiasm we built yesterday, what would it take, and it could be a Saturday game against Chattanooga, what would it take to have one game a year, general admission?

I wish they would. I don't know if they can. So I thought that same thing yesterday. When I was there, I thought to myself, what if they could, just what you said, sir, which will be my Kentucky-branded call today, what if they could one day a year just give it to the general public like that? General admission, you got to stand in line first come first serve. It would be awesome. I don't know logistically if it's possible.

I think a lot of the season ticket holders would kind of say, let's do one. It doesn't have to be a good team. But I'm with you. When we play Stonehill, let's do that. High point. Whoever it is, one day a year, do that. I talked to, I got to talk to Mitch Barnhart for about 30 seconds this weekend. I saw him somewhere.

And I said, and he sort of said, what do you think? And I was like, I think things are going good. and he said, what's next? He wasn't asking me, but he was like, what's next? And I said, do an event, if you can't do camp out, do an event like that, right? Maybe that's this, sir. You have one game a year where you have to camp out somewhere to get the tickets so that it's like the hardcore people that go,

because that atmosphere, I agree with you, it'd be nice if once a year we could recreate it. Thanks, you take the call. Appreciate it. Do you agree with that? Yeah, those fans that were there yesterday. those are the fans we see at the SEC tournament in Nashville. They can't get into Rupp for a regular season game. And Nashville's becoming almost too expensive for the average fan, honestly.

So events like that, we see the guys that drove in from Tampa, the guys that gliding the wheelchair from Knoxville. They make this trip to be a part of that. And we see the energy and the excitement that filled Rup yesterday. That was one of my first thoughts when we walked on that court and sat down. And as we said earlier, the energy an hour before Pope even came out was insane. I was just thinking if there were a basketball game about to be played right now. It'd be insane.

I don't care who they're playing. Once a year. There's no way they'd win. If you could just once a year, let it be the people that were there yesterday. I know that's not realistic to happen all time. I get it. But if you could do that once a year, you would create the best atmosphere that's ever been in Ruppery. You would once a year.

Who's next? Anthony. Anthony. How are you, Anthony? Hey, fellas. How are you doing? Hey, Matt, you know what? I was my wife's third choice.

Man, we turned out great. That's good to hear. Yeah, and I'll tell you what, something that got me fired up is I got to watch the interview with Rick Patino. And, man, I'll tell you what, man, he was gushing over Mark Pope. He was. The things that he was saying. And I'll tell you what, when he was finished talking, because you know how Rick is. And, man, I tell you what, I got pumped up just him talking about, about,

Park Pope because I was not real familiar with him. But I think absolutely will be playing against him. I agree with him. I think that'll be some, so it'll settle a lot of bad blood and it'll just, like you said, he's bringing everybody together. Yes, I appreciate the call. I think we all do owe, honestly, we all do owe a thank you to Rick Petino for that. You know, Rick Petino, and I've been one of the leaders, so I can't be.

like act above it we've all been pretty hard on Rick Patino for years now to be fair he deserved it a lot too so let's not I mean flipped us off there's a lot of stuff that's happened over the year but with that said with that said it took a lot of it took a lot of you know character to get up and make that statement and to say he would donate to Kentucky's in IL to help Mark Pope you know who would have ever thought there's a day that Rick Patino would probably get a better OVay at Rupp tomorrow than Cal would. Who would have ever thought we would end up there? Well, why don't we make that game?

We just talked about the St. John's game and let the fan base react how they ever want to react when Rick comes out. You think it would be a good reaction? After what we saw yesterday, I think half the crowd was wearing a 96 t-shirt. I'm wearing one right now. I think it would be a positive reaction. Now, if you invite him in, you got to win.

You got to win that game. Well, that goes back to the Arkansas game, too. like we need to win. But I just want you to think what it would be, what it will be like next year. I'm not going to say if we win. I'm going to say we win. I want you to think what it's going to be like in that arena

when we play Arkansas and then we win. You want to talk about a celebration. And I hope if we do, he's got a team full of freshmen. I mean it. I'm not trying to be rude. I just hope he does. I hope he has a team full of freshman. And I hope we take a team full of freshmen.

the guys we have and we beat that would be fun but I would hate to put Bruiser in that situation in that press conference. There's still going to be a Frank Franklin coming at some point I'm sure. Hey, all right, so I have something new for everybody to get you ready for the derby

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Why does it get longer? Stop making it. Quasset got to get longer. take a break and be right back. It's KSR. Welcome back, Tucky Sports Radio. 859-280-2287. Final segment.

Folks here on KSR, been a fun few days. One person writes, Matt, you all sound more giddy and joyous than I've heard you in months. Would you say that's true? Well, I can't speak for them, but it's true for me. The last year,

especially the last, two or three months, but really the last year to a year and a half has been exhausting with what, with the relationship with the basketball folks and just the cons, just what that meant on just a day-to-day basis for me and us. You know, I had nothing to do with the show. It was just exhausting, and it was exhausting behind the scenes, and there's a lot of stuff that nobody knows about except these dudes. But, you know, I does feel like for me like a great weight lifted off.

That's the best way I can put it. Just like a great weight lifted off. And I am excited. I'm excited for something new. And so, yes, I'm much giddyer today than I was three weeks ago. I'm very giddy because I can honestly say yesterday was one of my favorite Kentucky basketball memories. And I didn't even see a basketball. I don't even think there was a basketball there.

And that is seriously one of my favorite memories as a Kentucky fan, one of my favorite moments, one of my favorite events. and they didn't even play. It was a press conference. I will remember that forever. Seeing people downtown piled up on top of each other, many of them knowing it's a slim chance they're going to get in the building at that point, and they're just doing catch chance all to go into a press conference.

Friday morning, when we started the pre-show, from the time that the show ended then Friday afternoon, I think myself included a lot of people flipped about not being a little anxious or nervous about this hire to being super excited and ready to go with this hire. Shannon, you were probably the one. Now, to be fair, you'd been gone for a lot that it happened since Cal left. You were probably the one that was the most skeptical and or negative at the show Friday. Have you come around?

Yeah, first of all, that's fair to say. I think after watching it, yeah, I mean, you get the hype, the energy, the excitement. That was just fun yesterday. I wasn't even there. I watched the stream of it. But, yeah, I mean, I think that's the shot in the arm that the fan base needs. So I'm at least going to give them a chance and we'll see what happens. Yeah, I totally agree.

What do you expect the first year to be like? I mean, again, it's hard to answer that without knowing the roster, right? Do you think we make the tournament next year? Yeah, and I'll say even before Pope was announced and I've said on the show, I am not nearly as concerned about a roster as everyone else is. He started with a blank canvas, I guess with Travis Perry. But the times are just so different. You can go to the portal and have this NIO money and build a roster

in a week. So I think, you know, there will be a dip, but I'm confident they'll make the tournament, and I'm confident he'll put a team out there that we're still excited about, even though they'll take some losses. I think year two is going to be the year that we really sort of judge Mark Pope on, but don't get me wrong. I think he's going to be good in year one. I think year two, I'm not going to make any judgment about him as the UK coach until at least year two. I'm going to have fun with next year. And even if things don't go great, great, I'm still going to have fun. With that said, I think they're going to be good next year,

but for exactly what you said, if we had had to replace Cal five years ago, we would have been awful the next year. Oh, yeah. Awful, because we wouldn't have been able to get any players to come, and all of his players would have left. Now we have a fighting shot to be good in the first year, Ryan, and that's what's exciting.

I love what Pope said yesterday, man. He goes, I've got 12 other guys in my 96 group chat. they will not let me fail. They'll be on me every single day if something's not going right. So he's being held accountable by his peers. And even some of these players he's looking at for BYU, I see the reaction like, oh, we're already ended up with BYU's players. That's ridiculous.

They finished ranked ahead of Kentucky last season. They won at Kansas. They beat Baylor. These aren't just scrubs. Let me mention that about BYU players. Okay. If the three guys we get from BYU, and I think we're going to get three,

if three guys get from BYU were our three best best, players. Let's just say that's the case. They were a six-seed in the tournament last year. It's not like they were trash. They were a six-seat, and if we go get their three best players, that's still good. But they're not going to be our three best players. We're going to go get some dudes better than them. So we've got to fill out a roster. I say this with all due respect to Jordan Berks, to Adieu, to Aaron Bradshaw.

I'd love to have had all those guys come back. Hopefully at least one of them will. But the three dudes we might get from BYU are better than them. They are. They're better than them. Jackson Robinson, if we get that kid, that's an NBA player. He's an NBA player. He is going to play in the NBA.

Okay, you may not know him, but he's still an NBA player. There's a kid from Oklahoma State that they're going after right now. I don't even know his name, but you know what? He was the best player on their team. He'll be pretty good. We got a kid coming in this week to visit from Drexel. Well, okay, maybe you don't think he's very good. Well, I'll tell you who else thinks he's good.

North Carolina, St. Johns, and Louisville are trying to get him. So just because he played at Drexel, you know, when we get these high school recruits, it's awesome to be exciting. But the reality is they didn't always produce in college. now you're going to get dudes who produce in college court physical therapy k-or-t dot com if you have physical therapy needs call court k-k-r-t dot com they got 70 locations all over you don't need a doctor referral they'll get you without pain and back on your feet it's court dot com

make sure there's no reason to live in pain go with court dot com five seconds before we go on each on the guy uh he just didn't win the news conference he hit a grand slam and just crushed it yesterday got everybody excited We're back exciting and unbelievable times for BBN, and I love the touch of nostalgia that comes with it. The University of Kentucky fan base is back unified as one, and that is extremely exciting, and we're about to kind of have our program back to the way

we've always been looking forward to it being. Thank you all very much here for coming out. Thank you for listening. We'll see you tomorrow. This has been Kentucky Sports Radio. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends.

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