Mitch Barnhart reveals what Mark Pope said to him in initial meeting
After the John Calipari era came to an end for Kentucky, the Wildcats have a new leader in Mark Pope, as he was officially announced as the man taking over the iconic college basketball program on Friday.
Following the news the rocked the college basketball world, Kentucky athletic director Mitch Barnhart took some time to explain how Pope endeared himself to the Wildcats throughout the coaching search, and what he said to him during the initial meeting to prove he was the man for the gig.
“I really appreciate Mark’s desire to bring the Big Blue Nation and all of us together as we galvanize to go back and be who we want to be,” Barnhart said, via Kentucky Sports Radio. “The first thing when we sat down he says, ‘Mitch, thanks for the opportunity to sit down with you. That place changed my life.’ He says, ‘The trajectory of Mark Pope’s life changed the day I walked on the campus at the University of Kentucky.’ He said, ‘That place means more to me than you can possibly imagine.’ That, no one can replicate that DNA. No one can. And so it’s passionate and it’s emotional.
“That’s what you get when he told — I don’t want to steal all the stories because he’s got some great stuff. But when he talks about the autograph signing line after the national championship, and what it meant to the people as they stood in line to to catch a chance to have a glimpse of a national champion, that’s the heartbeat of all of our fans from border-to-border in the state and Mark gets that. And that’s what I want to make sure that we galvanize that, we galvanize our department around that.”
Evidently, the passion Pope has for Kentucky, coupled with his immense abilities as a coach, made him the perfect candidate to takeover the job from Calipari, per Barnhart.
“There’s been some things that have happened that we need to be banded together better, and I’ve challenged Mark to really be thoughtful of how we do that. And that’s important to me,” Barnhart added. “That helps us as we create culture within our department and culture within our team and our locker room. And we become a program that walks out with that name on the front of the jersey. And we walk out there representing the Big Blue Nation and the four million people in our state and worldwide that is so important. That’s what I think.
“I’m hopeful that we can be, as a department, better and that’s on me. And as a basketball program that people feel that. II want them to feel that when they walk in. We understand the goal. We’re going to have the presser in Rupp Arena. It’s going to be in Rupp Arena.”
Kentucky has had a rough go of it over the last couple of seasons, according to their standards, especially in the NCAA Tournament. We’ll see if Mitch Barnhart is right about Mark Pope. The college basketball world can’t wait to find out.