Mark Pope: 'I'm a way handsomer guy with UK on my chest'

Mark Pope feels good in Kentucky Blue. After the Wildcats’ sixth practice under the first-year UK head coach, Pope revealed how recruiting differs at Kentucky compared to his former school, BYU.

“Every time that I get to walk into a building with UK on my chest, it just feels different recruiting,” Pope said. “I’m a way handsomer guy with UK on my chest. Man, it just comes out of my soul every time I get to introduce myself to a recruit and say ‘I’m Coach Pope, the head coach at the University of Kentucky.’ Like, I can’t — that just doesn’t roll off my tongue.

“It catches me every single time because I know what this job is, and I know how blessed we are to have a chance to be here affiliated with this incredible University.”

Pope hasn’t rested on the recruiting trail since Kentucky hired him in April. First, he retained 2024 four-star commit Travis Perry, who is the all-time leading scorer in Kentucky high school basketball history.

Additionally, Pope picked up commitments from former South Carolina commit Trent Noah and former BYU commit Collin Chandler.

Pope also found massive success in the transfer portal, adding Amari Williams (Drexel), Lamont Butler (San Diego State), Otega Oweh (Oklahoma), Andrew Carr (Wake Forest), Brandon Garrison (Oklahoma State), Koby Brea (Dayton), Kerr Kriisa (West Virginia), Ansley Almonor (Fairleigh Dickinson) and Jaxson Robinson (BYU).

Mark Pope claims Kentucky isn’t for everybody

The 51-year-old head coach has traveled from Argentina to Turkey in search of perfect fits for the Kentucky brand. He believes his hard work is necessary to find players capable of excelling at the prestigious program.

“I got to coach at a great institution before this at BYU that had some significant filters in terms of the players that would fit in that program,” Pope said. “And certainly, Kentucky has massive filters also because there’s just not that many players that are built to play here.

“They’ve got to be the best players in the country and they’ve got to want to take on the most amount of pressure and scrutiny of any players in the country. And they have the highest standard of any program in the country. So finding those pieces is different also. It’s kind of a nice mix.”

Kentucky still has one scholarship spot available on its 2024-25 roster. However, Pope has previously emphasized he is in no rush fill it.