So much for the new hire........

[wldktz8]

Hurley (king of college coaching) first 4 yrs at Conn
73-47
Billy D first 4 at FL
78-49
Pope first 4 at BYU
87-41
It will be okay.

He went 23-11 with his level of talent at BYU in the Big 12. UK will naturally attract better talent if you are halfway decent with recruiting. UK will end the regular season with at least 25 wins next season.

 

[BlazerHallsBallsN96]

Coach Mark Popes lesser known BYU team beat Kansas, Baylor, Texas, Iowa State and North Carolina State this past season. Not bad IMO.

This perspective should help people see it. He just beat Kansas who CCC could not using 10% of the star power hahaha.
Who really wants to stand by the statement that recruiting will be the same at yoo frickin kaaay as BYU. Make me laugh. And if you do there's already two players that called coach Pope back saying hey I'll come play at Kentucky but not BYU. It's already happening

 

[Bkocats]

3 years is a rather long leash

I don’t think so as long as we see effort and improvements each year …

 

[Wally2000]

I pine for Pressing defense. I think Pope will bring it.

I’d settle for any defense at all. After the Kal ole defense we’ve been playing

 

[DreadLox]

NiL money aint keeping Big Z. Not on board till i see real recruiting success. And not guys ranked #50 portal or high school or worse. Thats a joke.

Research the HS rankings of UConn's players.

-edit-

in the 90s.

 

[Snarks0]

I’m not excited but I’ll support him. Put together a good class and have a great season and I’ll buy in even more.

 

[johnc17]

Watch some of BYU's games from last year. This is exactly what we've been asking for with Cal. I think the talent will come with the Kentucky name and NIL. Pope is a fine coach. The guys he won with last year were all undersized and less talented than the teams they beat but played a Smart brand of basketball. Watching them stick to their man's hip in m2m defense while being physically outmatched was night and day compared to our Swiss cheese defense last year. Pope just has to reel in some dudes which I think he will.

 

[SPECT imaging]

......reuniting the fanbase.

I'll admit that I'm not thrilled with the hire, but I like Pope as a person, and think he's 5 times hungrier than Cal was his last 9 seasons.

I'm hopeful Mark can pull together a strong class from the portal and start this thing off right.

At the very least, I'm still excited that Calipari is gone, and that's enough for me to live on until we give Pope a chance.

The fan base will behave according to results. No mystery.