Mark Pope picked up many of his coaching traits while playing for Rick Pitino on the best squad he ever assembled at Kentucky. Pope will show on Saturday in Atlanta if resiliency was one of those traits.
If ever the student needed to show what he learned against the teacher it’s when the struggling Wildcats take on Pitino and St. John’s in the CBS Sports Classic.
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UK might be the most disappointing team in college basketball through the nonconference portion of the season, tumbling from preseason No. 9 to unranked by Week 6 of the polls. The lowest point came during the Wildcats’ 35-point loss to Gonzaga in Nashville, as they were booed by their own fans.
St. John’s has also failed to measure up to expectations so far, although dropping from preseason No. 6 to currently being ranked No. 20 hasn’t been as precipitous as the Cats’ fall.
Both programs are pretty desperate for a win in this game. And it took that desperation for Pope to delve into his bag of what he learned from Pitino.
After losing to the first four Quad I opponents the Cats faced, Pope resorted to using the bench for motivation in a way he hadn’t previously done. His instructions became more like commands than guidelines as he’s had a sharper edge on the sidelines.
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The result produced UK’s win over Indiana and could be the breakthrough it needed.
The Cats sorely need to build on the positives from that victory where their perimeter shooting still came up lacking, but heart and hustle powered them through.
Kentucky’s defense also took a big step forward against the Hoosiers, holding them to season-lows with 60 points and 16% shooting from 3-point range.
That win will mean little if the Cats don’t follow it up with a strong performance against the Red Storm.
Here’s where Pope will have a chance to show Pitino what kind of coach he is. UK’s shooting was supposed to be its strength on a team that was assembled specifically to have a multitude of shooters.
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In their five games against major conference opponents, the Cats rank 105th in adjusted offense, according to BartTorvik.com. Pitino’s defense has been worse.
In the Red Storm’s three games against Quad I opponents (Alabama, Iowa State, Auburn), they ranked 133rd in adjusted defense and allowed opponents to shoot 36% from 3-point range.
The opportunity seems there for UK.
Pitino doesn’t lose much to the former assistant coaches and players that make up his coaching tree. He’s been particularly harsh to the players.
Billy Donovan is the most accomplished former player turned coach under Pitino’s umbrella. He coached Florida to back-to-back national titles in 2006 and ’07 and made two additional Final Four trips in 2000 and 2014.
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Before Donovan left college to start coaching in the NBA in 2015, the one thing he left without doing is beating his former coach.
Pitino owned a 7-0 record against Donovan, including when he led Louisville past the Gators in the 2012 Elite Eight in their final meeting.
Travis Ford and Steve Masiello are the only two former players who have beaten Pitino on a list that includes Scott Padgett and John Pelphrey. Pitino’s 18-4 against his former pupils and three of those losses came while he coached at Iona in 2021 and 2022.
Ford — in leading Massachusetts over Louisville 72-68 on Dec. 13, 2006 — is the only former player to beat Pitino when he was at UK, UofL and now St. John’s.
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The lone time Pope faced Pitino, Utah Valley lost to Louisville 98-68 on Dec. 23, 2015, was his first season as a head coach. He’s learned a lot about coaching over the past decade, but the best way to prove it is to beat Pitino and show he can still get UK a seat at the head of the class this season.
Reach sports columnist C.L. Brown at clbrown1@gannett.com, follow him on X at @CLBrownHoops and subscribe to his newsletter at profile.courier-journal.com/newsletters/cl-browns-latest to make sure you never miss one of his columns.
This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Kentucky vs St. John’s game gives Mark Pope opportunity vs Rick Pitino
