Tag: Kentucky Wildcats

LEXINGTON, Ky. — Some days, he pretended to be Rex Chapman in the 1990 NBA Slam Dunk Contest, recreating all those aerial assaults on an 8-foot goal. But most days, if grade-school Reed Sheppard was shooting on his backyard basketball hoop, he imagined that he was … himself in a Kentucky uniform. The seconds ticked down, the Wildcats needed a bucket, and the kid from London, Ky., was going to deliver.

“I’ve always been a little boy from Kentucky who wanted to play at Kentucky,” Sheppard says. “It feels like that was me just two days ago, out in the yard with my friends and my cousins, taking that last shot for Kentucky.”

Today, there are children across the state pretending to be Reed Sheppard. More specifically, Reed Sheppard on Tuesday night at Mississippi State, where the Wildcats trailed by 13 in the second half before the boy wonder turned his lifelong vision into reality. Sheppard scored 23 points in the final 13 minutes — 11 of those in the last 93 seconds — and buried a game-winning floater with a half-tick to go in Starkville. His heroics kept alive 16th-ranked Kentucky’s hopes of winning an SEC championship and stoked dreams of a deep NCAA Tournament run. He’d already put together a terrific freshman season, but this was a superstar performance: 32 points, seven assists, five rebounds, two blocks, two steals. And that boy-in-the-backyard moment.

“To hit a game-winning shot for Kentucky,” Sheppard says, “was really special for me.”

REED SHEPPARD WINS IT FOR KENTUCKY 🚨 @KentuckyMBB pic.twitter.com/1pevWzZwfu

— SEC Network (@SECNetwork) February 28, 2024

During ESPN’s broadcast, Jimmy Dykes recited a biblical play on words that has been popping up on homemade signs in the Kentucky crowd this season: A Sheppard boy shall lead them. The faithful understand a simple truth, that each of the program’s eight national championship teams had a native Kentuckian among the top six scorers. That makes Sheppard, in many eyes, not only the most important player on this roster, but the most important person in the state.

Chapman knows better than anyone what that level of in-state celebrity is like. He was Sheppard almost 40 years ago: son of a well-known basketball figure, homegrown hero, Kentucky’s Mr. Basketball, McDonald’s All-American, and then an instant sensation for the Wildcats. King Rex, as he came to be known across the Bluegrass State in the 1980s, understands all the adulation, expectation and pressure that comes with being basketball royalty around here. It nearly swallowed Chapman whole back then, and sometimes he can hardly believe how well Sheppard is thriving in that same circus now.

“When I ask his dad how Reed is doing, he knows I mean how is he handling all the people, the crush of all this on his shoulders,” Chapman says. “The important thing is he has a great support system. I really didn’t, and I was more immature than him at this age.

“So you do wonder how Reed does it, how he makes such an incredibly hard thing look so easy, until you remember who his parents are. Then you go, well, that makes perfect sense. He was literally born to do this.”

Jeff Sheppard, Most Outstanding Player at the 1998 Final Four, and Stacey Reed Sheppard, a two-time state champion at Laurel County High and top-10 scorer in UK women’s history, have made arguably the largest alumni contribution in the history of the school. Their 19-year-old son is straight out of central casting for Cats fans’ wildest dreams. He’s got Kentucky basketball in his actual DNA, and he plays the sort of steady, selfless, all-around game that makes John Pelphrey, a member of Rick Pitino’s “Unforgettables” in 1992, say the younger Sheppard is “a throwback guy who could’ve absolutely played with our team.”

It is exactly that ethos — he’s one of us — that made an entire state fall in love with the wunderkind even before he proved the clutch gene is hereditary.

You see, Kentucky fans “believe wholeheartedly that when a Kentucky boy wears the Kentucky jersey, that boy plays harder and it means more to him,” Jeff Sheppard says. “Whether it’s true or not can be argued, but I think the state is feeling that right now. We’re winning, we’re scoring 90 points a game, playing a style that is appealing to the eye, and there’s a Kentucky boy out there. The whole state is connected to him.”

Jimmy Mahan is a lifelong Kentucky fan and owner of Roadshow Cards, which has sports card shops in California, New York, Texas and his home base of Lexington, Ky. He recently paid $1,900 for a one-of-five autographed Reed Sheppard card, which he says he’ll never sell at any price — although that price would be absurd right now. A 1-of-25 autographed Sheppard card was going for $5,000 on eBay on Wednesday evening. Mahan says that among current college basketball players, only Iowa star Caitlin Clark and LeBron James’ son, Bronny, are hotter on the card-collecting market.

That’s nationally. Locally, his popularity is unmatched. Mahan thought he’d never seen a player so beloved as 2022 national player of the year Oscar Tshiebwe, “and then Reed came along right after and it’s just a whole other level.”

“I would say 90 minutes do not pass in my store that I don’t get asked if I have a Reed card or a Reed autograph,” Mahan says. “If we’re open, someone is always walking in or calling and going, ‘Got any Reed? Got any Reed? Got any Reed?’”

Mahan hosts several autograph-signing sessions for Kentucky players past and present — current Cats can finally capitalize on their celebrity, thanks to name, image and likeness rules — but his eyes widen when he imagines what a Sheppard signing would look like. He’s had preliminary conversations with Sheppard’s parents, who help manage his vast NIL opportunities.

“When does a Reed signing end? In this state? How long would it go?” says Mahan, who estimates he would pay Sheppard $3,000 an hour to sign for fans. “It would basically come down to how much money he wanted to make, because an unlimited signing might go all night.”

That level of attention could be a lot for anyone, let alone someone who was so painfully shy as a little boy that his big sister, Madison, did his talking for him. But Sheppard wanted to get comfortable interacting with fans and being a public figure — because he so vividly remembers what it was like to be the one begging Kentucky players for a picture or signature. Back home, there’s a photo of grade-school-aged Sheppard with then-UK-star Tyler Ulis, who is now helping coach him as a student assistant on John Calipari’s staff.

“I enjoy doing that for people,” Sheppard says, “because I was that fan as a kid.”

He also watched both his parents handle their local celebrity with grace and humility. He grew accustomed to total strangers fast-walking in the family’s direction at a restaurant or the grocery store and striking up a conversation like old friends. Before he knew better, young Reed would tug on Jeff’s arm and demand an introduction.

“Mind your manners!” Jeff remembers telling him. “Once they went away, I’d say, ‘Son, that’s a Kentucky fan.’ He’d say, ‘But do they know you?’ And I’d say, ‘Well, they feel like they do.’ ”

Stacey puts it another way.

“They want to know you,” she says. “Anything they can do or say to share a relatable moment with you, that’s what they’re looking for, and you can see the pure joy when you’re able to give that to them. Reed being from here, growing up with us, he understands what that means to people here, so it’s not an obligation or a bother. It’s a way of giving back to what he’s loved his whole life.”

When Jeff is out in public with Reed these days, fans still rush toward them — but often to talk to the younger Sheppard.

“They’ll say, ‘Hey, Reed!’ and I’m going, ‘How do you know them?’ and now he gets to say, ‘Dad, mind your manners. That’s a Kentucky fan.’” Jeff says. “Now I’m Reed’s dad. I’m no longer Jeff Sheppard, and that transition has been a blast.”

After home games at Rupp Arena, Reed lingers a long time in the stands, posing for pictures and signing posters or basketballs or jerseys with the No. 15 that he wears — and Jeff wore — at Kentucky. The coaching staff and school administration have both asked whether the family would like them to do some crowd control, shew away those long lines.

“We’re like no, absolutely not,” Jeff says, “because this is home, and that’s who we live with. That guy, that’s our neighbor. We go to church with those 10 people. Those 20 are his family. Those 17 are his high school coaches and teammates. That’s the difference. We live here, and when all this is done, we’ll still be here. These are our people.”

That doesn’t mean everyone deserves your time and attention. While Jeff believes Kentucky fans are no more hysterical today than when he played, now there’s a whole other level of access to the players, via social media, that is an unnecessary distraction at best.

“What we are trying to help Reed navigate through — and trust me, it’s important for us as parents also — is that you have to be very careful what you listen to,” Jeff says. “Because when I was at Kentucky and I finished a game, I did not drive from house to house to get everybody’s opinion on how they thought I played. So for him, and for us, simple is the word. Simple is the key to his success right now. He plays a simple game, because we’ve taught him that the consistent execution of the basic fundamentals is what always wins, in basketball, in life, in family. So keep it simple.”

For Reed, that’s getting harder every day.

Sheppard is putting together a historic freshman season. He’s just the third high-major player in the last 30 years to record at least 100 assists, 75 steals, 60 made 3-pointers and 20 blocks in a season — and he’s only played 28 games. Lots of people thought, or at least hoped, he would be a really nice multi-year player for the Wildcats, but none dreamed that he might be so good, so fast as to become a one-and-done draft pick. Certainly not when he arrived with a loaded recruiting class that included Justin Edwards, Aaron Bradshaw, DJ Wagner and Rob Dillingham, who were ranked the No. 3, 4, 6 and 16 prospects in the Class of 2023. Sheppard was ranked 43rd.

“I thought it was actually going to be tough for him to get minutes,” says Scott Padgett, an All-SEC teammate of Jeff’s on the 1998 national championship team — and now a Mississippi State assistant. “I thought he would have a good career, but I’m not going to sit here and act like I knew he would do this right out of the gate. I did believe he would be very good at handling it, though, because of his parents.

“Put it this way: When I played, Jeff Sheppard was Reed Sheppard. Everybody loved Shep, and he could’ve been pulled every which way, but he was so level-headed and calm and focused that it never got to him. Stacey was the same. So if anybody could help Reed deal with everything that comes with this, it’s them.”

Sheppard is helping his teammates cope with the most overwhelming elements of Kentucky basketball. When Edwards, who was hyped as a potential No. 1 overall pick, struggled enough early this season that some quickly labeled him a bust, Sheppard suggested he meet with a mental health coach. He and Edwards also devised a simple plan for picking each other up in an instant: If one of them was down, the other need only flash a big, goofy grin to remind them it’s not that serious. Just smile.

After Edwards delivered the game of his career, a 28-point outburst on 10-of-10 shooting in a win over Alabama, he said Sheppard helped guide him out of the dark days that preceded it. When Sheppard stepped to the line for two tying free throws at the end of regulation at Texas A&M in January, just a week after he sank six straight in the final 19 seconds of a win at Florida, Edwards gave him that goofy grin from the bench. Sheppard smiled, then buried them both.

“Everything in my mind kind of just cleared out,” he says. “Those are the moments you want.”

Therein lies the answer to a wild question: How does a guy who doesn’t even start for his team run away with national freshman of the year — and vault into the NBA Draft lottery — as Sheppard sure seems to be doing? By not caring at all about any of those peripheral concerns. Whatever anyone says he should be, there’s only one thing he wants to be: a winner. And nobody impacts winning for the Wildcats like Sheppard, who has a chance to break Kentucky’s single-season records for both 3-point percentage and steals. Only eight freshmen in the last 15 years have posted a better season-long plus/minus than Sheppard’s, and all of the others became top-five picks.

“I don’t know that my ego could’ve taken being the best player on the team and not starting,” Chapman says. “But again, why are we surprised? Jeff is one of the great teammates of all time.” In fact, at Pitino’s request, Jeff redshirted the year after Kentucky’s 1996 national title, in what would have been his senior year, to clear time for future lottery picks Ron Mercer and Derek Anderson, before coming back as a leader on the 1997-98 squad under Tubby Smith.

“The fact that Jeff didn’t leave tells you that Jeff is tough, tough,” Chapman says. “And when I look at Reed, he’s a lot like him in the way teammates love and respect him for the way he goes about his business.”

Ah, yes, his business. It’s booming. Sheppard has NIL deals with Donato’s Pizza, Planet Fitness, WinStar Farm, The Dairy Alliance, Forcht Bank and White, Greer & Maggard Orthodontics, plus team-wide agreements, all of which add up to a payday that conservative estimates have put in the mid-to-high six figures. There’s certainly seven-figure potential as his star continues to rise, though Jeff says the family has turned down several more offers to keep the focus where it needs to be.

“I didn’t come to Kentucky to do NIL,” Reed says. “The whole goal was to come play basketball, get better, win a national championship.”

But what if the Wildcats don’t this season? How long will he chase that dream in Lexington? Does legacy matter to the kid who grew up with Kentucky posters all over his walls and whose father helped raise two banners to the Rupp Arena rafters?

Reed Sheppard and his sister, Madison, attend a Kentucky game with dad Jeff Sheppard as kids. (Courtesy of the Sheppard family)

One giant pile of money or another will be there waiting for him when the season ends, either way. And Sheppard’s might be the rare case in which there’s enough NIL earning potential to offset the financial risk of passing up a lofty spot in the draft.

“It’s a good question,” Jeff says. “I don’t think he’ll stay or go based on NIL, but to say it’s a non-factor is not accurate. It’s not like we sit down at the dinner table every night breaking down draft classes over the next four years trying to figure out when to go — we don’t talk like that — but we’ll make a thoughtful decision when it’s time.”

If Sheppard keeps climbing draft boards, conventional wisdom suggests the decision will be made for him. But Padgett doesn’t think so.

“I’m not saying he’ll stay four years, but I would still be shocked if his career lasted one,” he says. “If there are weaknesses they think he can work on and improve in a year, I could see him staying another year. They’re going to look at this differently than most, for one because the NIL is probably crazy, but also because education is huge to them and he’d be another year closer to a degree, where he could then come back and finish it in the summers. And, to be honest with you, there’s an unknown factor.

“They are such a close, close, close family, and Reed has lived his whole life in London and Lexington, so I don’t know that there’s a real rush to get out of there unless you’re 100 percent ready. Plus, if he comes back, he’s a rock star. He’s Michael Jordan and Muhammad Ali. In that state, he would be that.”

At least for a few more weeks, Reed Sheppard is right where he always wanted to be. So while his mother long ago gave up asking how reality compares to the dream, because he’s never been a big talker and “you can’t hardly get his feelings out of him,” the truth is plain to see.

“Watching him play with that big smile on his face, there’s really nothing he needs to say to me,” Stacey says. ”As his mom, that tells me he’s loving every minute of this and he’s having the time of his life.”

(Top photo: Courtesy of Chet White / UK Athletics)

LEXINGTON, Ky. — On April 4, 2015, John Calipari was the king of college basketball. He’d brought Kentucky to the Final Four for the fourth time in five years, this time with an unprecedented 38-0 record and a shot at not only his second national championship but also one of the greatest seasons of all time.

On April 5, 2015 in Indianapolis, his Wildcats led Wisconsin by four points with five minutes to go, seemingly destined for a title-game collision with Duke and nemesis Mike Krzyzewski. That is, until Calipari effectively deflated the basketball, ordering a team with seven eventual NBA draft picks to play stall ball. “I don’t like this. It ended up in a bad shot last time,” legendary broadcaster Bill Raftery told the television audience, groaning as he watched plodding possessions that mostly ended in hurried, off-balance heaves. Calipari buried his face in his hands as the dream season disintegrated.

The next day, news broke that Calipari was voted into the Naismith Hall of Fame, so he stayed in Indianapolis to accept awkward congratulations. He sat before reporters, still shell-shocked from the night before, fielding alternating questions about his career’s most devastating loss and most prestigious honor. It was as if he’d slipped and fallen off Kilimanjaro just shy of the summit, only to somehow wake up atop Everest. “I feel phony,” he said that day.

Kentucky and its coach have never quite been the same since.

More than eight years later, Calipari and the Wildcats have not been back to a Final Four. They’ve won one NCAA Tournament game in the last three years. The mountaintop has faded from view, and the question now is whether a 64-year-old Calipari can climb again or if he’ll continue the descent in his 15th season in Lexington. The slide was subtle enough at first — Kentucky was one shot away from returning to the Final Four in 2017 and 2019, and won the Southeastern Conference by three games in 2020 before COVID-19 canceled the postseason — but the decline began in those waning moments against Wisconsin.

“I really believe that game broke him,” said one former support staff member, who, along with four others, requested anonymity to protect their relationship with Calipari.

“That year took a lot out of him,” said another former staffer. “It was such a unique opportunity to do something that had never been done, and to lose it all in the national semifinals … The next year, the vibes were entirely different.”

The Athletic spoke to former Kentucky assistant coaches and support staffers, as well as basketball agents and NBA front-office personnel, about why the Wildcats have fallen and whether Calipari can recapture the magic. Several themes emerged:

• Calipari’s patience steadily shrank in recent years, which led to a shorter fuse with players (and some staff) and a less detailed approach to preparation. “He used to be a really good teacher,” a third former staffer said, “but then he would just speed through practice.”

• He became less innovative. Gripping the wheel too tightly in that 2015 Final Four loss, incredibly, did not convince him to unleash all that talent. Instead, he clamped down harder. “We used to put in real offense, run real stuff,” the second former staffer said. Calipari famously adopted and popularized the dribble-drive motion offense, which empowered his five-star guards to make plays. But in recent years? “He stopped letting his guys go,” the staffer said.

• As Calipari dug-in stylistically, even publicly scoffing at the 3-point revolution that has overtaken basketball at every level, he also turned cantankerous, seeking out slights and holding grudges. He picked fights with Kentucky’s athletic director, with the biggest radio personality in the state, and with the Wildcats’ wildly popular football coach — and he obsessed over those feuds. “He’s at his best when his back is against the wall or he has somebody to prove wrong,” said a fourth former staffer, “but there’s a delicate balance there, and he started to lose focus.”

Most prominently, those who spoke to The Athletic cite significant turnover on Calipari’s staff as an ailment that has plagued the program. Calipari has signed an unmatched 58 five-star recruits, had 47 NBA draft picks, including 35 first-rounders, 23 lottery picks and had three players taken No. 1 overall since his arrival in Lexington in 2009. But key personnel losses shattered the support system that channeled the coach’s best traits and challenged his worst ideas.

Over the past three years, especially, that allowed a crack in the foundation to become a chasm.

NBA star Karl-Anthony Towns once called Kentucky assistant coach Kenny Payne “the horse beneath the jockey driving Kentucky basketball.” Former lottery pick Willie Cauley-Stein said: “Kenny is the backbone. He keeps that sh– tight.” Lakers All-Star Anthony Davis predicted in the summer of 2019 that the Wildcats would “definitely take a hit if (Payne) leaves.” After nearly a decade of recruiting, developing and bonding with players, Payne left Lexington in August 2020 for an assistant coaching job with the New York Knicks; he is now head coach of rival Louisville.

DeWayne Peevy, a longtime Calipari consigliere who’d risen to deputy athletic director, left that same month to become athletic director at DePaul. Peevy’s job, in part, was to manage a steady stream of Calipari’s big ideas. He listened, debated, filtered, vetted and, when necessary, vetoed. Whenever ideas actually got through to AD Mitch Barnhart, Peevy would joke, “You don’t realize the 78 things I got rid of before I came with these two.” With that buffer in place, Calipari was free to dream wildly and speak freely. “I never focused on telling him no,” Peevy said in 2020. “I really just focused on getting him to understand that his vision had to match the department’s vision. I think he respected that. There was a trust level there.”

During that 38-1 season in 2015, the New York Times profiled then-assistant John Robic, whom the headline declared was “happy to sweat the small stuff for Kentucky.” Robic, who’d also been a trusted Calipari adviser at Massachusetts and Memphis, was the brains behind pregame preparations. His film study was exhaustive, his scouting reports thorough and his game plans clear-eyed. “He’s Cal’s right-hand man,” former No. 1 pick John Wall told the Times. “Robes does the other things – allows Cal to be as efficient as he wants.” Calipari’s mentor, Hall of Fame coach Larry Brown, said then that Robic “basically allows John to do his job.”

A year later, Calipari moved Robic into an off-court role, and in April 2021, off the basketball staff. Neither Robic nor Calipari, who both declined to comment for this story, have publicly discussed what led to their falling out.

“That is a huge one,” said the second former staffer. “Robic was the scout. He was very detailed, just really knew his stuff. He was one of those guys Cal leaned on in a lot of ways, for a lot of things, that I think maybe after 30 years together, you just kind of take for granted – and when they’re gone, there’s a massive void there.”

The 2016-17 team, led by De’Aaron Fox, Malik Monk and Bam Adebayo, was “the last fun team to watch at Kentucky,” said the third former staffer. After that season, Calipari “became so tight with the reins. We got away from the dribble-drive and he started trying to over-coach. He tried to under-teach and over-coach, and that’s a bad combination.”

Calipari’s infamous Two Circle play, often used as a stall tactic, “became our go-to offense,” the second former staffer said. Some European teams run versions of a Circle offense, but with pace and creative wrinkles. Calipari’s version? It was a “meat grinder,” said the third former staffer. “We were running good offense against Wisconsin, went to Two Circle and lost it.”

Last season, a team featuring three former five-star recruits, several coveted transfers and reigning national player of the year Oscar Tshiebwe got outclassed by Tom Izzo and Michigan State, Mark Few and Gonzaga, Mick Cronin and UCLA and even SEC newcomer Dennis Gates and Missouri before the new year. At that time, The Athletic spoke to several opposing coaches about what seemed to be the problem.

“I’m not sure what Cal wants. It’s like there’s an identity crisis,” said one.

“Their offense is archaic,” said another. “It’s gotta be the same sh– he was running with the New Jersey Nets.”

In addition to Robic, Payne and Peevy, four more assistants and several other support staffers have left in the last three years. Joel Justus, who helped UK land Adebayo and develop Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, went to Arizona State, then N.C. State. Tony Barbee, who played for Calipari at UMass, worked for him at three schools and was the brains behind the Wildcats’ defense, took the head-coaching job at Central Michigan. Jai Lucas, who is considered one of the country’s top young coaches, bolted for Duke after two years in Lexington. KT Turner took the UT Arlington head-coaching job after one season.

Additionally, longtime media relations director and Calipari confidante Eric Lindsey took a PR job outside of sports during the 2021-22 season. Longtime assistant video coordinator Andrew Ortelli, who helped fill the scouting void when Robic exited, took a promotion at Temple this summer. TJ Beisner, who organized Kentucky’s name, image and likeness efforts and was another trusted sounding board for Calipari, took a similar job at North Carolina last month.

“He doesn’t have anyone around him who understands how he thinks now,” said a fifth former staffer. “He’s a genius. He really is. But like any kind of creative person, you have to know how to channel it, and I just don’t think he has that anymore.”

In a 1981 Sports Illustrated profile of Bob Knight headlined “The Rabbit Hunter,” writer Frank Deford described how the infamous Indiana coach struggled to practice what he preached to his players: Don’t go chasing rabbits or the elephants will kill you. Deford wrote: But the coach doesn’t listen to himself. He’s always chasing after the incidental.

In recent years, a cold war with his boss, Barnhart, has become one of Calipari’s rabbits. The bombastic coach and pragmatic AD differ dramatically in personality and disagree about what constitutes sufficient university support for the winningest program in college basketball history. Their relationship has become strained since Peevy left, and it came to a boiling point in the summer of 2022, when Calipari publicly demanded a new practice facility — which Barnhart deems unnecessary — and inadvertently picked a fight with football coach Mark Stoops by calling Kentucky “a basketball school.”

A surreal news conference followed, in which Stoops and Barnhart effectively told Calipari to zip it. To no one’s surprise, he did not take that well. Recently, Calipari has adopted a catch phrase repeated often to the media: “Administrations win championships.” It’s always delivered in the context of explaining that SEC basketball is better now because more schools are committed to the sport the way Kentucky always has been.

“DeWayne worked as a go-between that allowed Cal and Mitch to have the type of relationship they probably wanted from the very start: Look, we’re not the same people, not similar personalities, but we need each other,” said the fourth former staffer. “They didn’t need to deal with each other every day because he had an intermediary in DeWayne. But there was never any thought to what happens when DeWayne leaves.”

Calipari thrives when he’s left alone to recruit talent, mold star-studded rosters into unselfish teams and promote the brand like a cocksure carnival barker. But he needs trappers around him to keep the rabbits out of sight. With fewer of those in the building, Calipari seems to have taken his eyes off the prize. In addition to his rift with Barnhart, he spent the better part of two years not-so-subtly beefing with radio host Matt Jones, obsessing over what he believed was overly harsh criticism.

“There’s been times the team wasn’t performing well and he was focused on saying some sh– or putting out something to get back at Matt Jones,” said the fourth former staffer.

Chasing those rabbits has taken a toll.

Last season, he frequently referenced how tired he was. Pregame news conferences, where he once delivered bold proclamations, not-so-humble brags or not-so-subtle jabs, became almost nonexistent. He zipped through postgame news conferences. He began hand-picking who got to ask him a question after games — and tried to avoid follow-up questions.

After a home loss to Vanderbilt on March 1, Calipari spoke for just five minutes on his postgame radio show, where hundreds of fans waited in Rupp Arena as he joined the host courtside. He made an abrupt exit, explaining, “As you can tell, I am beat down right now. I’m tired. This has been a tough run.” Assistant coach Orlando Antigua took over the show.

“He’s just worn out,” said the second former staffer. “He ain’t 54 anymore. He’s 64.”

This summer, Calipari reunited with Chuck Martin, who was with him at Memphis when the Tigers made three straight Elite Eights and played for a national title. He brought in John Welch, an old friend with two decades of NBA coaching experience and a revered player development guru. Calipari also hired a video coordinator with NBA experience who also worked at San Diego State.

Calipari said Martin is “going to be tremendous for us” and has “already had an impact on our recruiting.” Kentucky just landed its first five-star recruit in the 2024 class. Welch “helped me put in the dribble-drive with Vance Walberg when I was at Memphis,” said Calipari, who would like to get back to those roots this season with a guard-heavy roster. “He’s a guy that loves to teach.”

Martin and Welch are “more like Cal’s previous staffs,” said the fifth former staffer. “They’re more, ‘We’re here to win games. What do you need from us, Coach?’”

Calipari’s first need is always going to be talent. He has that this season, after signing an old-school recruiting class that ranks No. 1 nationally, including five-stars Justin Edwards, Aaron Bradshaw, DJ Wagner and Rob Dillingham. He went against his nature the last two years, trying to win with transfer-heavy rosters and veteran teams, but now Calipari has leaned back into the youth movement that made him famous. This roster features eight freshmen and only two seniors.

“If you ask me talent or experience, I’m taking talent, and the talent usually figures it out,” Calipari said at media day last week. “Look, I’m not changing. I’m going to recruit the best freshman player that I can get. Now, you could say, ‘It’s not going to work anymore!’ Well, we’ll see.”

Everything we’ve seen from these Wildcats thus far, from a four-game exhibition romp in Canada to a rollicking series of preseason highlights, suggests Calipari is going to play a more modern brand of basketball. That could be purely out of necessity, as none of the Wildcats’ three 7-footers has been available, but the coach appears to be getting comfortable playing with pace and space, five-out and firing away from deep.

The college basketball world remains skeptical. Kentucky has its lowest preseason ranking ever under Calipari – 16th – and is picked to finish fourth in the SEC.

Still, maybe Calipari, at this late stage, can lead a revival.

Just last summer, he ranted to the program’s local television partner about how important it was to make Big Blue Madness, the famous preseason basketball extravaganza and UK’s premier recruiting event of the year, great again. Once a must-see spectacle, Madness had become stale. “You can say, ‘It’s not that big a deal.’ It could (impress) one player and that one player can help you win a national title,” Calipari told WLEX-TV. “That John Wall stuff and that Madness got us Anthony Davis. You gotta be talking about Madness for a month or we didn’t do our job. It’s unacceptable.”

So what did Calipari and Kentucky deliver for Madness in 2023? The least-exciting event to date. There was no viral dance like Wall’s in 2009, no Drake in the layup line like 2014 — or Drake on the video board introducing Calipari in 2015, or Drake wearing a “Kentucky Dad” hoodie on the bench in 2017 — no Michael Buffer like 2016 or even Bruce Buffer like 2019. There were no braggadocious lines like Calipari’s oft-repeated, “We do more than move the needle; we are the needle” from 2011.

This year, former star DeMarcus Cousins introduced Calipari — “The GOAT. Y’all better put some respect on his name” — and an increasingly gray-headed man ambled onto the stage, not in one of his signature Italian suits, but in a UK pullover and jeans. Calipari addressed the crowd for less than a minute. The only shorter Madness appearance by him was in 2014, alongside Drake, when he simply said, “Enough talking, let’s ball,” and literally dropped the microphone.

This was not that. “Let’s watch these guys play and enjoy it,” Calipari said, with minimal enthusiasm, “and let’s get on with this.”

(Illustration: John Bradford / The Athletic; photos: Dylan Buell, Andy Lyons, Jacob Kupferman / Getty Images)