John Calipari on college basketball: 'You can't do this now with seven freshmen'

In the new NIL era of college basketball, John Calipari has learned that he will have to adjust his approach. The new Arkansas head coach primarily made his name at Kentucky, Memphis and other stops off of routinely signing the top freshmen in the country.

Calipari achieved plenty of success doing so, reaching six Final Fours and even leading the Wildcats to a national title in 2012. But today is a much different environment than it was back then.

Speaking at the SEC spring meetings on Wednesday, the coach opened up about how his roster-building process has changed in light of what he’s learned over the past few seasons.

“It’s been a breath of fresh air, you could say,” Calipari said. “Fifteen great years. We got a lot done. I think last year’s team with what we were able to do playing so many young guys. The lesson was, you can’t do this now with seven freshmen. You just can’t. You’re gonna hit a team that’s 25 years old on average and that team’s physically gonna get ya. So now we have a couple of transfers that are older. Some kids that transferred from Kentucky that went through it and are a year older and some freshmen.”

Kentucky routinely brought in some of the top recruiting classes in the country, ranking among the top three in each of the past five seasons under Calipari. However, while that formula had previously led to success, had failed to make it out of the second round of the NCAA Tournament each of those years.

Now having learned from the way college basketball has evolved, John Calipari is ready to do thing differently with a fresh start in Fayetteville. The coach has already brought in six players through the transfer portal, three of which followed him from Lexington. Others who have joined the team include veteran such as former Tennessee big man Jonas Aidoo and Florida Atlantic guard Johnell Davis.

Of course, Calipari still also flipped three members of his 2024 recruiting class from Kentucky to Arkansas, including the nation’s No. 1 point guard Boogie Fland.

With that mix of freshman talent plus veteran experience, Calipari will hope to make a big splash in his inaugural season at Arkansas. The Razorbacks had only one player on the roster when he arrived, as he famously quipped at his press conference, so this is truly a roster of his own construction.

We’ll see whether it works out as the Razorbacks aim to make it back to the NCAA Tournament after missing this past season.