The full transcript of Mark Pope’s press conference after his Kentucky men’s basketball team beat Texas 85-80 on Wednesday at Rupp Arena: Mark Pope: Proud of our guys. I thought it was a great game tonight. Intense. Texas is a really, really potent offensive team. They’re the fourth-best offensive team we’ve played, one of the top offensive teams in the country, and they came to play tonight. I thought we had some great individual efforts on the defensive end, and some team efforts, and proud of our guys for grinding out the win.
Mark, just what did you think of Collin’s poise, especially in the second half, making some big plays down the stretch, and sounds like maybe he wasn’t feeling great leading up to the game. Pope: Yeah, Collin’s been sick, really sick, for the last couple days. Just gutted out practice. And then today, we just sent him home from shootaround. He didn’t come to shootaround today. (He) was pretty sick, but I thought he was great. That’s hard. You’re kind of like cold sweats in bed for three straight days and then get up and come compete in the game. And for him to come perform like he did. I thought he was elite. I thought he was aggressive. I thought he was sure. He turned down one 3 late that I want him to shoot that one too. But, man, he put together a really incredible performance. Seven rebounds in a game where that was, this is one of the best offensive rebounding teams in the country. Unbelievable job on Pope when he was guarding him. I thought both DA and Colin really gave us great efforts trying to corral Pope. And obviously he scored the ball really well, shot it really well. I thought he was elite. I thought he was great.
Q: First, an update on Kam’s injury, and also how important was it to have guys like Collin come in in the second half after his injury and just be able to kind of change the game offensively?
Pope: Yeah. So first of all, it was really important to have guys step up. Even – it’s really hard. I mean, you think about Trent, he’s had such limited run in the last five or six games, and he comes in and comes up with arguably the second-most-important rebound of the game. Kam’s foot’s broken, so he’ll be out. He’s just a beautiful kid. I thought he actually made some special plays tonight. So we’re going to get him back healthy as soon as we possibly can, but he’ll be out for a while, and it’s certainly a blow to us.
Q: Mark, 7-footers are nice. Three-point shooters are nice. But does every team need a Mo Dioubate, and is it a unique skill set out there?
Pope: Yeah. And the thing is like – you guys have heard me say this, you’re tired of me saying this, but – I love guys that love themselves, and he’s trying to love himself right now. He’s trying to love what makes him special. He had the most-important rebound in the entire game to close out. We’re small on the floor. We got BG out there. They’re running around, and they get up a shot, and there’s kind of a free rebound, and he just goes and grabs it. It’s pretty much game. That was pretty much game. There could have been some other things that went wrong, but he was great as a secondary guy in transition. Had a couple great plays to the rim. He was great defensively. You just feel like you’re never at a deficit when he’s switching on to anybody. He brings energy. We need to be more and more and better and better, but he’s important for us. And I count on him to be just a physical, physical, energy man child out there, and he’s done that for us the last couple games.
Q: Mark, Malachi Moreno tonight really stuffed the stat sheet again. Went plus-19.What is his game really doing for you all right now, especially with JQ out and other injuries happening? What kind of player is he molding into, and how important is he when he’s on the floor?
Pope: He’s really smart. You know, he’s a 6-2 (assist-to-turnover) guy with a really tough matchup. This is a really tough matchup. This Vokietaitis, man, he is the number one foul-drawing player in the entire country. And so that’s a handful. And Malachi had a complicated guard all over the court. Complicated in ball screens, complicated curl protects. We have the ball in his hands so much, he led us in assists today, by far. Like, our next-highest assist guy had one. Malachi had six. So to give you a sense of how much the ball is in his hands. Half the time I’m putting a play call in, and Malachi’s like ‘No coach, we already got it. We already talked about it as a team. We already figured out what we want to do. He is a coach on the floor as a freshman, as a 7-foot freshman. And so I’m proud of him, and he continues to get better and better and better. You think about him is a six-assist, five-block, two-turnover guy. That’s a ridiculous number. That’s really good.
Q: Denzel stepping into that point guard position, obviously with Lowe out for the season now, how have you seen him step into that role? What have you thought of his performances Over the last couple games?
Pope: We’ve been putting a lot on his shoulders and a lot on Otega’s shoulders. Those guys are logging big minutes for us right now, and he just had great poise. I was so proud of Denzel. One of the things, Texas is one of the best teams at not giving up assists, and they’re also one of the best teams at forcing your 2s to be longer. I think they’re in the top 20 in the country in forcing you to take long 2s. What that means is you’re taking shots from 9 and 8 and 7 feet instead of shots at 6 and 5 and 4 feet. Their whole defense is built around that. And so when you come off ball screens, especially – our guys really screened today – you come off ball screens and you’re free, and they’re just teasing you into that play. They’re bringing a lot of pressure on the retreating guard they’re teasing into taking that 10-foot shot. And he took a couple early – he can make that shot, – but then later in the game, he got really, really stubborn, kept his dribble alive and actually kept driving long enough for the Gortat (screen) to come into play, and then actually got shots at the rim and got fouls. And that’s mature, mature, elite-level, high-IQ basketball to combat guys that are showing you a drop defense.
I thought he was spectacular, man. Like, I’m really proud of him. This is his third straight game where he’s just been unbelievable. He was great again tonight. And defensively, he was really special. Coach. McLean was trying to slow me down because I was so excited about his defensive effort. He was like, ‘Coach, let’s wait and watch the film.’ But from my vantage point during the game, I thought he was really good defensively.
Q: Coach, I hope that it’s not lost on media and the Big Blue Nation how important it is that you’re not just coaching games to win, but you’re developing young men on and off the court. I certainly think the confidence is pointing in the right direction. With that said, you talk a lot about connectivity. Where did that show up most for this team tonight and through the last several games?
Pope: That’s a terrific question. So I’ll tell you a couple places it showed up. So we all watch Kam walk off the floor, and that’s a gut punch. It just is a brutal – you know, J-Lowe’s out, JQ’s out, Kam’s limping off the floor, and so that was a moment where connectivity came in. Because our guys are just like, ‘OK, listen, the only thing we can do for Kam right now is go play, and then we can cry with cam in the locker room after. But, like, the only thing we can do right now is play,’ and that brings guys together. I think our first four minutes of the second half, I thought we came out well, and then we kind of made some mistakes, and they closed the gap and us reminding each other in the huddle like, ‘Hey, man, we’re first media timeout. We’ve actually had a successful first four minutes, even through the frustration.’ So I think you see that come out when we’re battling frustration, which we’ve battled a lot of frustration the last couple of weeks, and battled it successfully. I think it comes down to big moments, too. I think it comes down to late-game, stressful situations where these guys have been unbelievable in their management of late-game situations. You know, I’m sitting there the last play where DA draws the foul with 1.5 seconds left on the shot clock. You’re sitting there and you’re just thinking, ‘Man, I gotta throw out this timeout. I gotta use it, I gotta use it.’ But I’m kind of like this, these guys have earned my trust, and they’re together enough and a lot of times as the play develops, they’re going to get something better than we’re going to get if we try and take a timeout… . Yet again, they did it right? At the right time. So I think you’re seeing connectivity a lot of ways with these guys, which is special. It’s important. It’s something they’ll take with them their whole life. We had a great, great pregame speech by one of our GA’s, Gabriel McKay, who was just terrific, and he talked about how much our guys love each other and how that manifests itself on the court. And so that’s a theme that we talk about every single day. Clearly I care about it.
Q: Mark, you look at what you guys were able to do from the foul line tonight. You go 30 of 35 and that’s honestly, not a space that you guys have lived in too often this season. What growth have you seen from this team in terms of earning those free throws and also actually converting them from the foul line?
Pope: Well, I thought that was a really important part of this game. It was patience. Sometimes you get to free-throw line because you’re belligerent, driving, putting your head down, and you end up with a really poor two-point field-goal percentage. It didn’t feel like that. today. It felt like we were earning fouls because of our patience in our attack. We probably had more second- and third-side possessions than we did all season long in any game so far this season. Part of it was because of the drop. But the drop tricks you into going fast and… taking shots you don’t necessarily want to take, taking low-percentage points. So the foul line deal is a big deal. You know, we knew coming into this game this is the top free-throw drawing, foul-drawing team in the country, one of the top offensive rebounding teams in the country. For us to tie them on the glass was really important for us, to outshoot them from the free-throw line was really important. Two massive keys to the game.
Q: On the same note, with the free throws. A few weeks ago, you guys were up on Missouri. They end up coming back. The team can’t really score. Falls apart. Since then, you guys have won four straight. Tonight, again, no field goals late, but what can you say about your team’s decision-making and connectivity and staying together and making the right decisions to prevent that?
Pope: That was good. I thought DA was great. I thought Collin was sure. Winning catches, protecting the ball. I thought we came up with some huge rebounds down the stretch. I thought our guys communicated defensively pretty well. So I thought it was good. It’s hard to question these guys’ ability to function late in games. I mean, for all the things that we are working on, if you track our last four games, it’s hard to say this team doesn’t function really well in late-game situations. They’re amazing. It’s unbelievable. We’ve been really fortunate also, but we’ll take it.
Q: I want to ask you, Otega picked up that fourth file and you brought in Trent. He only gave you three minutes. He came in there and gave you that time, grabbed a couple rebounds. I know it’s easy to overlook just the raw numbers but what do give you in that spurt?
Pope: Well, he just played a couple minutes last game, couple minutes this game. He hasn’t played much before then. He’s gonna have to play now, and he can. He’s a good player. He actually is going to help us win. Like he’s a really – he started games for us; he’s a really good player. And so he’s gonna get more minutes, and he’s gonna be really great and he’s gonna help us. I’m gonna take a minute talk about this. Just so you get our word here on what’s happening in the NCAA right now with eligibility. We’re all shaking our hands being like, ‘This is so incredibly creative.’ I’ll give you my two cents, just so you have it. At some point, I don’t have hard feelings towards anybody making any decision. Because every single college program and college coach are the most competitive people in the world. They’re going to try and find any avenue they can to find an advantage. It’s just, it’s what we’re paid to do. It’s what we do. The one stopgap that is kind of spreading right now, that maybe has some legs is kind of a last stand is, the NCAA does get to decide who gets to go to the NCAA Tournament. Like they get to decide that. They have that power. And so at some point, when they’ve been very, very clear about what the rules that they’re going to try and enforce, they might lose in court, but they still get to decide what games count towards the NCAA tournament. And I’m not saying that to penalize any team. I’m just saying that because at some point it is important that we take a stand and regain some tiny ounce of sanity. And until someone tells me different, I still believe the NCAA has full power over who gets in the NCAA tournament and what games they count towards your NCAA Tournament bid. And at the end of the day, that is what drives all of us. So hopefully we’ll take a stand there and clean this up for everybody. For everybody. Because right now, everybody is chasing their tails, and I think it’s a place where you can take a stand. I hope we will. This game matters too much. The NCAA Tournament’s too extraordinary a deal. These high school players and these young players and all these players matter too much. College basketball matters too much. It’s just time to just take a stand, bring a little bit of sanity to this deal, say it publicly, and let’s move forward. So let’s go .
