Mark Pope tells story from his playing days to illustrate his vision for Kentucky

If there’s one thing Mark Pope would like to see out of his team at Kentucky, it would have to be effort. The newly hired coach knows from his time playing in Lexington that it takes hard work to win championships, which he helped the Wildcats achieve in 1996.

Pope arrived on campus as a transfer from Washington in 1993-94 and made his Kentucky debut during the 1994-95 season. He recalled feeling a desire to prove himself among the other high-caliber players on the roster and arrived determined to do just that.

But when Pope decided he would make a late-night gym trip to put in extra work and get ahead, he found he wasn’t alone. That’s the moment he learned how important work ethic was across the entire team, and it’s something he hopes to instill in his players.

“You’re gonna hear from me every day relentless 24/7 work and I learned that here,” he said. “I was here for maybe two weeks and I had transferred in and I couldn’t believe I was at the University of Kentucky. I’m like, ‘They’ve got all All-Americans. I’ve gotta catch up.’ It’s 11:30 at night and I’m in the Wildcat lodge like, ‘I gotta go get some extra work in while all the other guys are resting and sleeping.’

“So I walk across the street to Memorial Coliseum and open up the door and I hear balls bouncing. I walk in there and it was like five guys. It was JP, Shep, DA and TD in there in a full sweat already. Those guys taught me how to work.”

Those lessons paid off as Mark Pope averaged 7.9 points, 5.7 rebounds and 1.2 blocks across his two-year career with Kentucky. He clearly proved himself among the All-Americans and earned a sizable role to average around 20 minutes per game.

Pope would go on to play for six seasons in the NBA before getting into coaching. He climbed his way up the ladder to earn his first head coaching job at Utah Valley in 2015 and later took over at BYU in 2019.

He’s carried those lessons learned in Lexington with him wherever he’s gone, and now it eventually led him back to where it all began. As he looks to guide Kentucky back to the success it enjoyed during his time there, he also wants his players to understand what it means to wear Wildcat blue.

“I learned about resilience here,” Pope said. “Here at Kentucky, resilience is a requirement. I learned here that passion wins championships. Sometimes when you’re on the court competing with all the passion you can, your insides end up all over the floor. I learned that from my guys. I learned about gratitude here at Kentucky. Entitlement leads to sorrow and depression and gratitude leads to joy.

“What all these players know and all of our future players are going to learn really quick is that they are not doing those jerseys a favor by letting the jerseys clothe them. Our guys will know quickly that it will be one of the great honors of their life to put that jersey on.”