John Calipari tenure has featured two parts at Kentucky

“The Godfather” was a cinematic classic that was split into two parts. Some — perhaps most — would argue that “The Godfather Part II” was the superior film. However, the original is still considered one of the all-time greats. We’ll just ignore the third for now.

John Calipari has had two parts at Kentucky, but the second is coming up short of expectations.

We have had seven full Kentucky basketball seasons following that heartbreaking loss to Wisconsin in the 2015 Final Four. The Wildcats have yet to make it to the third weekend of the NCAA Tournament since that horrible night, and the program is now on a 10-year national title drought.

The data shows us that the program has taken a step back under Calipari.

Return to glory

Kentucky and Tubby Smith decided to move on after the 2007 season and that led to Billy Gillispie as the next coach in Lexington. That hire went horribly, and athletics director Mitch Barnhart was on the hunt for another coach just two years later.

John Calipari became the man for the job, and the results were immediate. Once on campus, the former Memphis head coach recorded huge recruiting wins getting Eric Bledsoe, DeMarcus Cousins, and John Wall to be on his first team at Kentucky. Overnight, the Wildcats became a national championship contender.

From there, Kentucky went on one of the best six-year runs in program history.

• Record: 190-38 (.833)
• SEC record: 82-20 (.804)
• 3 outright SEC titles
• 3 SEC Tournament titles
• NCAA Tournament record: 22-4 (.846)
• 4 Final Four appearances
• 4 top-10 KenPom finishes (3 in top-five)

For this run, Kentucky was the gold standard in college basketball. The Wildcats were competing for national championships almost yearly and were dominating SEC play twice going undefeated in the regular season. There was a one-off year with the NIT appearance in 2013, but other than that it was dominance by Kentucky with the Wildcats consistently winning in March. The program was a break or two away from winning as many as three national titles in this run.

Lost mojo

After defeating ACC champion Notre Dame in the Elite Eight, Kentucky headed to the Final Four in Indianapolis with a 38-0 record and was two wins away from becoming one of the best college basketball teams of all time. However, a tough matchup with Wisconsin ended in a loss, and both the program and fan base are still trying to recover from that moment seven years later.

On the floor, we’ve seen the Kentucky program remain top-15 good, but it simply has not come close to the bar set by the first part of the Calipari era.

• Record: 175-63 (.735)
• SEC record: 91-34 (.728)
• 2 outright SEC titles
• 3 SEC Tournament titles
• NCAA Tournament record: 9-5 (.643)
• 0 Final Four appearances
• 4 top-10 KenPom finishes (0 in top-five)

As the SEC has gotten tougher in basketball, the Wildcats have taken a step back. Kentucky is still the best program in the league through these seven years, but the Wildcats have not been one of the best in college basketball. The NCAA Tournament record sticks out and the 9-16 year in 2021 is the worst in program history and something that will always be talked about when discussing the Calipari era.

Meanwhile, the program suffered three losses to mid-major programs — Evansville, Richmond, Saint Peter’s — in consecutive seasons after avoiding that outside of the NIT year in 2013 during Cal’s first six years.

Similar results forced Tubby Smith out

In his first season as the head coach at Kentucky, Tubby Smith brought home a national championship as the Wildcats went 35-4 and knocked off Utah in the final. After the Rick Pitino era, the bar was set extremely high, and Smith just couldn’t match results in his last nine seasons.

• Record: 228-79 (.742)
• SEC record: 106-38 (.736)
• 2 outright SEC titles
• 4 SEC Tournament titles
• NCAA Tournament record: 17-9 (.654)
• 0 Final Four appearances
• 6 top-10 KenPom finishes (2 in top-five)

As the data shows, Smith had better results than the last seven seasons for John Calipari. The winning percentage overall, in conference, and the postseason are all just a few percentage points better. Meanwhile, the team has graded out better possession-by-possession in adjusted efficiency at KenPom.

Those results simply were not good enough for the program 15 years ago.

Crossroads moment

It may be warming, but John Calipari is not on the hot seat yet. Kentucky owes a lot of money to the head basketball coach, and the Wildcats are still a top-15 program and that might be selling them short. However, things are not trending in the right direction.

College basketball is changing with the transfer portal and name, image, likeness (NIL). The past year showed that Kentucky has made the right adjustments to allow the blue blood program to take advantage and be the first at the table to land the best players. However, results on the court matter most.

If things keep trending in the current direction, it might be best for both parties to split up similar to the ending of the Smith tenure following the 2007 season. Calipari has issues to fix and they must get fixed fast.