In all honesty, I think we all thought losing Pope to Kentucky was a real possibility at some point.
I think what surprises most is that we lost him after he did next to nothing at BYU to prove himself as a winning coach. I thought for sure we would win at least one conference championship, or at least one conference tourney championship, or at least one NCAA tournament game. Heck I thought to land the Kentucky job he would have to take us to a few Sweet 16s at minimum.
It’s surprising to me the bar was so low for them to take such a relatively unproven coach.
That said, I am grateful for what he did do here. This last season went much better than I thought it would and while I credit the players, I credit Pope for that as well.
The best part of Pope leaving is we got to see BYU’s commitment to BYU BB and sports in general. Who would have thought BYU would swing for the fences. Makes me extremely optimistic for our future in all sports.