Mitch Barnhart on Mark Pope: 'He knows how important it is to the state'

Mark Pope is a Kentucky guy, which was why athletic director Mitch Barnhart ultimately chose him.

Since the hire, Barnhart has said that he wants the Kentucky basketball team to play for the name on the front of the jersey. Off the court, he believes no one embodies this in the way Pope can. On it, however, the Wildcat alum boasts a unique offensive philosophy.

“When you talk to the people in the basketball community, they talk about the unique offense that he runs and the way he forces teams to defend,” Barnhart told KSR. “… they shoot the threes, they have — they were third in the country in made threes, they were first in, I think, three-point field goal percentage, so they were up there at least in the top five all year. Their offensive efficiency is high-level, they were 81 points a game.

“So when I talk about why, that fits in today’s landscape of college basketball. Obviously, we had a team that was [scoring in the] upper 80s this year and sometimes on the defensive end we didn’t get as much as we used to, and so I think what Mark does, he brings a little bit of his style as a player when he was here.”

Pope was a 6-foot-10 forward during his playing days.

“The players like to play that way and he’s already put that in his stuff and it’s really good. And so as you talk to some of the basketball, I’ll say junkies, but if you talk about some of the people that are sort of into the nuances of the game, Mark’s on the cutting edge of those things offensively and defensively.”

Barnhart continued, saying that he expects to see next year’s Kentucky team become a “throwback,” closer to what Kentucky was in the 90s as opposed to what John Calipari built in Lexington for 15 years.

The Kentucky athletic director used phrases like tenacity, toughness, positivity, contagious, and relentless to describe his new men’s basketball coach.

“He went to venues and hosted teams in his first year in [the Big 12] and probably should have been named Big 12 Coach of the Year,” Barnhart said. “He did not get that but he went into places, he beat teams that we didn’t beat. He beat teams of people that we interviewed.

“I’d just say he has a lack of fear of the situation. He is ready to take everything on and he knows how big this job is. And he knows how important it is to the state. And so that’s more than one. It means a lot to him.”

Fans will get the opportunity to hear from Pope himself as he addresses Big Blue Nation inside of Rupp Arena on Sunday. His introductory press conference is set for 4:30 p.m. ET and fans are welcome to attend, free of charge.