We are proud to announce that Justin Rowland has taken over as the publisher of CatsIllustrated.com.
Rowland has been with CatsIllustrated.com for three years and is recognized as the leading voice and authority on Kentucky football recruiting. He joined the site around the same time as the hiring on Mark Stoops and has been ahead of the story right from the start.
T.J. Walker will serve as the site's full-time basketball recruiting analyst and Alex Forkner will now have full-time duties as a staff writer, primarily covering the football and basketball team on a daily basis in Lexington.
Outgoing publisher Brett Dawson brought Rowland onto the CatsIllustrated.com team three years ago and will be pursuing other professional opportunities.
"I can't express how excited I am by this opportunity," Rowland said in a statement. "For the last 15 years I've been working with Rivals.com in some way, oftentimes providing coverage all over the country. But my relationship with CatsIllustrated.com has been special and I know the site's subscribers realize that. This is the one opportunity that I could not pass up and I am honored to be in this position. I've always prided myself on my work but this means more than any other position I've had. The Kentucky brand on Rivals.com is just about as big as it gets.
"More than anything I'm very happy to announce that we've locked up both T.J. Walker and Alex Forkner. They're all in with us and we are very fortunate to have them. They're trusted figures, they will help make sure this transition is seamless, our site members know them well, and they are ready to expand their already-impressive coverage. If you have a great team then keeping it in place is the goal when there's a transition at the top. I'm proud we were able to do that. As a staff we will be involved on the premium message board every single day, engaged with all of our loyal subscribers. This staff will have a reputation for outstanding customer service and we will be personally involved in answering your questions, listening to your comments and concerns, and fielding your suggestions.
"In the days ahead you will learn a lot about our ambitious plan to make this website more respected than it has ever been. This website means a lot to me on a personal level and even more so now. It is an institution in this network and our goal is to make it better than ever. As our community grows and our content expands the loyal and long-time subscribers will know they are appreciated.
"Our site's basketball recruiting coverage will be expanded and more comprehensive than ever with T.J. greatly reducing his role in team coverage and gearing his work almost entirely towards the coverage he loves best and does as well as anyone. He will be at all the important events featuring UK commitments and targets. Keeping up with John Calipari and staying ahead of the curve is a full-time job, so our subscribers need a full-time effort. I'm glad it's a first-rate professional that they already know and trust who will be providing the coverage.
"I'm thrilled to announce Alex's promotion to a full-time staff writer position. It's well-earned and with his bigger role and increased responsibilities his talents will be on display more than ever. Great sports writers are outstanding journalists. They are also able to watch sports like a coach and then break things down like a teacher. His work with CatsIllustrated.com has already been very popular and recently that's more true than ever. Our site members who have been reading his practice reports know that he's putting in as much work as anybody, and he's going above and beyond the call of duty. He will be at every home football and basketball game, every media event that's available to the site and he will continue reporting on practices whenever those opportunities are there. He will also be available for some other coverage events when he's needed.
"As for myself, you will still recognize me as the person handling the football recruiting coverage. I'm very proud of the quality and integrity of my work thus far and I appreciate the interest so many of you have taken in the information I have been providing. Even with increased responsibilities my coverage of Kentucky football recruiting will expand and improve. Since T.J. and Alex have my complete trust, I can focus entirely on continuing to lead the football recruiting market, expanding my coverage and commentary to football and basketball, managing the site, and interacting with site members. I'm going to continue to be an active, everyday presence on the House of Blue forum. There I'll join the conversation that helps make the site great and behind the scenes I'll be available and accountable. I will be personally invested in several projects that I believe will revolutionize the Kentucky football recruiting market. Our coverage of Kentucky's biggest summer football camps will be the most thorough and informative that fans of the program have ever seen. We have an extensive plan to provide unprecedented coverage, scoop and analysis on every new offer that goes out. And we will be revamping the War Room, making it a weekly feature that's bigger, more thorough and better than ever before, setting the market standard. To top it off, T.J. will be providing a similar feature with all the latest basketball recruiting scoop, similar to some of his recent information that has been so popular on the site.
"In the days ahead you will learn a lot more about our plans to expand the site's coverage and content. Pregame analysis, game coverage and post game breakdowns will remain the elite standard that you have come to expect. There will be new features after the game and in the days following bringing you unique, independent and thorough analysis that covers every angle. Some of our features will highlight the best takes from our subscribers on the forums because this is the most active, biggest and best community of Kentucky fans interacting online. We will enlist experts covering Kentucky's opponents to bring you the most comprehensive coverage Wildcat fans can find.
"Each day will bring site visitors a new feature rounding up the biggest stories, latest scoop and top analysis from the previous day as well as a plan of what to look for coming up. We're also introducing a new feature that will look back at the best players, the biggest games and the greatest moments in UK history and these will generate some great discussion and unique takes as we look back in time.
"I want to thank Brett Dawson for allowing me to join the community and team here at CatsIllustrated.com," Rowland said. "I'm indebted to him for that and I wish him the best of luck in his future work."
Rowland has been with CatsIllustrated.com for three years and is recognized as the leading voice and authority on Kentucky football recruiting. He joined the site around the same time as the hiring on Mark Stoops and has been ahead of the story right from the start.
T.J. Walker will serve as the site's full-time basketball recruiting analyst and Alex Forkner will now have full-time duties as a staff writer, primarily covering the football and basketball team on a daily basis in Lexington.
Outgoing publisher Brett Dawson brought Rowland onto the CatsIllustrated.com team three years ago and will be pursuing other professional opportunities.
"I can't express how excited I am by this opportunity," Rowland said in a statement. "For the last 15 years I've been working with Rivals.com in some way, oftentimes providing coverage all over the country. But my relationship with CatsIllustrated.com has been special and I know the site's subscribers realize that. This is the one opportunity that I could not pass up and I am honored to be in this position. I've always prided myself on my work but this means more than any other position I've had. The Kentucky brand on Rivals.com is just about as big as it gets.
"More than anything I'm very happy to announce that we've locked up both T.J. Walker and Alex Forkner. They're all in with us and we are very fortunate to have them. They're trusted figures, they will help make sure this transition is seamless, our site members know them well, and they are ready to expand their already-impressive coverage. If you have a great team then keeping it in place is the goal when there's a transition at the top. I'm proud we were able to do that. As a staff we will be involved on the premium message board every single day, engaged with all of our loyal subscribers. This staff will have a reputation for outstanding customer service and we will be personally involved in answering your questions, listening to your comments and concerns, and fielding your suggestions.
"In the days ahead you will learn a lot about our ambitious plan to make this website more respected than it has ever been. This website means a lot to me on a personal level and even more so now. It is an institution in this network and our goal is to make it better than ever. As our community grows and our content expands the loyal and long-time subscribers will know they are appreciated.
"Our site's basketball recruiting coverage will be expanded and more comprehensive than ever with T.J. greatly reducing his role in team coverage and gearing his work almost entirely towards the coverage he loves best and does as well as anyone. He will be at all the important events featuring UK commitments and targets. Keeping up with John Calipari and staying ahead of the curve is a full-time job, so our subscribers need a full-time effort. I'm glad it's a first-rate professional that they already know and trust who will be providing the coverage.
"I'm thrilled to announce Alex's promotion to a full-time staff writer position. It's well-earned and with his bigger role and increased responsibilities his talents will be on display more than ever. Great sports writers are outstanding journalists. They are also able to watch sports like a coach and then break things down like a teacher. His work with CatsIllustrated.com has already been very popular and recently that's more true than ever. Our site members who have been reading his practice reports know that he's putting in as much work as anybody, and he's going above and beyond the call of duty. He will be at every home football and basketball game, every media event that's available to the site and he will continue reporting on practices whenever those opportunities are there. He will also be available for some other coverage events when he's needed.
"As for myself, you will still recognize me as the person handling the football recruiting coverage. I'm very proud of the quality and integrity of my work thus far and I appreciate the interest so many of you have taken in the information I have been providing. Even with increased responsibilities my coverage of Kentucky football recruiting will expand and improve. Since T.J. and Alex have my complete trust, I can focus entirely on continuing to lead the football recruiting market, expanding my coverage and commentary to football and basketball, managing the site, and interacting with site members. I'm going to continue to be an active, everyday presence on the House of Blue forum. There I'll join the conversation that helps make the site great and behind the scenes I'll be available and accountable. I will be personally invested in several projects that I believe will revolutionize the Kentucky football recruiting market. Our coverage of Kentucky's biggest summer football camps will be the most thorough and informative that fans of the program have ever seen. We have an extensive plan to provide unprecedented coverage, scoop and analysis on every new offer that goes out. And we will be revamping the War Room, making it a weekly feature that's bigger, more thorough and better than ever before, setting the market standard. To top it off, T.J. will be providing a similar feature with all the latest basketball recruiting scoop, similar to some of his recent information that has been so popular on the site.
"In the days ahead you will learn a lot more about our plans to expand the site's coverage and content. Pregame analysis, game coverage and post game breakdowns will remain the elite standard that you have come to expect. There will be new features after the game and in the days following bringing you unique, independent and thorough analysis that covers every angle. Some of our features will highlight the best takes from our subscribers on the forums because this is the most active, biggest and best community of Kentucky fans interacting online. We will enlist experts covering Kentucky's opponents to bring you the most comprehensive coverage Wildcat fans can find.
"Each day will bring site visitors a new feature rounding up the biggest stories, latest scoop and top analysis from the previous day as well as a plan of what to look for coming up. We're also introducing a new feature that will look back at the best players, the biggest games and the greatest moments in UK history and these will generate some great discussion and unique takes as we look back in time.
"I want to thank Brett Dawson for allowing me to join the community and team here at CatsIllustrated.com," Rowland said. "I'm indebted to him for that and I wish him the best of luck in his future work."
