love for his prior team and said that, even though BYU is a special place, it was still hard to leave his team behind. So why say that coming into BYU but not coming into Kentucky? IMO, it does suggest that Pope was disingenuous about his love for his own team and BYU. Maybe NIL has changed things and it just prevents coaches from deeply caring about their players and therefore makes it easier to move on. I’m not sure I agree with that. But even if it’s true, you don’t have to act like you have special guys and coach at a special place, and state as much publicly, if you don’t really mean it. Right now, Pope looks disingenuous. Not because of his sincere excitement about being at Kentucky. But because his guys apparently didn’t even mean enough to him to mention them. The only time he referenced his team, I think, was to say that they made the second most threes in the nation. But he mentioned this only to one-up his team and say, “but at Kentucky, we don’t finish second.”

I also found it quite interesting that Pope would emphasize the SEC tourney so much, suggesting that they’re going to win conference tournaments. That may well end up happening, who knows. But if it does, it’ll be a first for Pope as a head coach (and I think as an assistant too).