John Calipari notches 400th win at Kentucky with victory over Mississippi State

John Calipari reached another career milestone with tonight’s victory over Mississippi State. The Cats’ 90-77 win over the Bulldogs was Calipari’s 400th at Kentucky, bringing his all-time record in Lexington to 400-116. That’s second in program history behind — who else — Adolph Rupp, who was 876-190 during his 41-year tenure.

While it’s highly unlikely Calipari will ever catch Rupp on the all-time wins list, he is the third-fastest active head coach to reach 400 wins at a program, doing it in 516 games. Only Bill Self and Mark Few have done it faster, with Self tallying 400 wins in 484 games and Few in 499. That’s some pretty decent company. If you expand that list beyond active coaches, Cal is eighth all-time.

Fastest Division I men’s basketball head coaches to 400 wins at a single school:

– 477 games, Adolph Rupp (Kentucky)
– 484 games, Bill Self (Kansas)
– 494 games, Jerry Tarkanian (UNLV)
– 496 games, Roy Williams (Kansas)
– 499 games, Mark Few (Gonzaga)
– 510 games, Henry Iba…

— Corey Price (@coreyp08) January 18, 2024

That’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Calipari’s bragging rights. According to UK Athletics, Calipari is tops among active coaches in…

• Victories as the AP No. 1-ranked team: 110
• Wins against AP No. 1-ranked teams: 6
• NCAA Tournament wins: 57
• Sweet 16 appearances: 15
• 20-win seasons: 27
• 30-win seasons: 10
• Overtime wins: 33-18 record

Congrats, Cal! I think this calls for some brownies.

Calipari credits players for accomplishment

When asked about the 400-win milestone in his postgame press conference, Calipari waved the reporter off and said he didn’t even realize it was upon him until a Mississippi State player told him in the handshake line.

“Move on,” he said. “Just ask me another question. I literally did not know until their player came up to me and said, ‘Congratulations on 400.’ And I went, ‘Oh sh*t, I forgot about it.’ One of their players. My players, they don’t have any idea. They just want to know what we’re eating. ‘We have food back here?'”

Jokes aside, Calipari credited his players for helping him get this far in his career, opening up on the process of getting young guys to buy in.

“All I would say to you is, you stay long enough and you have enough really good players, a lot of those things happen. I’m not doing this for numbers. I don’t even know what my record is. I couldn’t care less.”

“But you could see I’m locked into, how can I help these players. Some of it is, you know how you help them? You put them on a bench and just sit them. That’s how you help them. Other times, you’ve got to hug them, you give them books for positive thinking and different things to get them to think different. You’re trying to teach them habits because their dominant habits are not real good when you’re 19 and 20; They’re just not good. You try to create new ones. And then every day is a battle of push and pull. And that kind of stuff happens.”

Calipari ended by joking that he must be “right near” Adolph Rupp’s mark of 876 wins, to which the reporter responded that he’s a little less than halfway.

“I probably am not going to have that,” Cal said, smiling.