Mark Pope reveals Kentucky played with 'Godfidence' against Tennessee

Mark Pope and the Kentucky Wildcats waltzed into the Food City Center in Knoxville and took care of business, defeating the Tennessee Volunteers by five on Tuesday evening.

Afterwards, Pope took some time to address the media, revealing their secret ingredient for the resounding win. Evidently, it was more than simply confidence for the Wildcats, as Kentucky utilized “Godfidence” while notching their 15th dub of the 2024-25 campaign.

“We always say a team prayer before we come out to play. Coach Brooks, Alvin Brooks, gave the prayer. He talked about, in his prayer, he prayed that we could have confidence, but even more importantly, that we could have ‘Godfidence.’ I’ve never heard ‘Godfidence’ before, but I love it, because that’s just — there’s a little bit of this team, for me — we’re a pretty faithful team,” Pope elaborated.

“There’s a little bit of us that — we’re kind of, in some ways, performing for an audience of one, the best we can. We’re trying to take all the other noise, and just kind of set it aside a little bit. So, when you see a game like this where, for us, this ‘Godfidence’ was a real factor in this, it ranks pretty high. It’s pretty special. I told the guys before the game, there’s no place I would’ve rather been tonight, and it was easy to double down on that after the game. So, we’re really blessed.

“This is a team that we believed from the outset, from the first few months, that we would have resilience. We will have resilience. These guys are loving each other enough that — we’re a really good team. It’s also challenging, right? But we do feel like we can withstand punches. We can withstand rough stretches. That we can get better from them. We’re really fortunate, and we’re really blessed. It was a good night for us.”

Whatever it takes, that’s all that matters for the Wildcats. Moving forward, Kentucky is going to need some more of their secret sauce, as the schedule doesn’t get much easier from here on out for the SEC program.

While it might not be their toughest game record-wise, emotions should be running high for their next game. John Calipari will return to Rupp Arena on Saturday evening, with the Arkansas Razorbacks. That’s one that Kentucky fans would love to win, no matter what.

With “Godfidence” at their disposal, anything is possible. Mark Pope will lead Kentucky into battle at 9:00 p.m. in Lexington on Saturday, and he’s hoping to have it in abundance this time around.