Mark Pope gets sushi roll named after him at Lexington restaurant

Move over, Coach Cal’s Chicken. Lexington has a new favorite dinner item.

Jeff Ruby’s, a high-end restaurant in Lexington, has recently released a new menu item to its sushi selection: The Father and Pope Roll, aptly named after new Kentucky Men’s Basketball head coach Mark Pope.

The sushi roll includes spicy tuna, hamachi, cucumber, panko asparagus, sriracha pickled carrots, shaved Serrano and Yuzu honey glaze. It’s on the menu right on top of the Stoops Roll, and right below the UK roll.

It’s unclear whether Pope has had time to sit down and enjoy his signature roll given the fact that he’s had his hands full piecing together next year’s Kentucky team.

Since Pope was named head coach earlier this month, Kentucky has landed commitments from four different players out of the transfer portal. Most recently adding 6 foot 10 small forward Andrew Carr, a Final Four hero in Lamont Butler, a three-time defensive player of the year in Amari Williams and a former top 100 recruit in Otega Oweh.

He’s also added incoming freshman Travis Perry — the all-time leading scorer in Kentucky high school basketball history — and former four-star recruit Collin Chandler, who was committed to Pope at BYU while spending the last two years abroad on a mission trip.

Not only that, Pope still spending his time trying to zero in on some more of the portal’s top dogs in Koby Brea, Great Osobar, Aidan Mahaney, Deivon Smith and Elijah Hawkins, among others.

On Monday, Pope made his debut on KSR, revealing that Kentucky’s “big board” was 29 names deep regarding potential targets. Some of those include players that are testing the waters by entering their names in the 2024 NBA Draft, stating the they’re “talking to a bunch of players in that category,” and plans to take a “surgical pause,” from the portal finalize his staff and wait for those players to make their final decisions.

Not only is Pope tackling building his initial staff and roster for the 2024-25 basketball season, but he’s also reaching out to athletes from the 2025 class and beyond, notably reaching out to four-star Malachi Moreno, a 7-footer that plays for Great Crossing (KY) High School in Georgetown, which neighbors Lexington. He previously held a Kentucky offer from the John Calipari regime.

Whether the names mentioned above will ultimately be the ones suiting up for Pope this season inside Rupp Arena or not remains to be seen. However, taking his foot off the gas and taking another “surgical pause,” to stop in at Jeff Ruby’s to eat his signature, spicy sushi roll might not be the worst idea.