KSR Today: Mark Pope, SEC Tournament seeding, and Mitch Barnhart

Good morning, folks! How are we doing on this fine Thursday? Cold and annoyed with Mother Nature? Yeah, me too…

There might not be any Kentucky games on the schedule today, but there is still plenty going on in the world of UK Athletics. First and foremost, Kentucky men’s basketball head coach Mark Pope will speak with the media this afternoon. He’ll surely be peppered with plenty of questions relating to the No. 15 Missouri Tigers, the Wildcats’ next opponent and the final game of the regular season. UK will be in Columbia on Saturday for a 12:00 p.m. EST (ESPN) tipoff.

Kentucky will make the trip to Mizzou without the worry of being the SEC Tournament’s nine-seed hanging over its head too. Last night, the Wildcats avoided missing out on the single-bye thanks to some help from Ole Miss, which took care of business at home with a 78-76 win over Tennessee. Regardless of this weekend’s outcome against the Tigers, UK will have a single-bye next week in Nashville. That’s significant.

It’s still possible Kentucky can jump as high as the five-seed too. A six-seed (the last game played on Thursday) appears most likely at this stage, but the ‘Cats can finish anywhere from 5-8. Avoiding starting the tournament on Wednesday was the most important piece of all this though.

While you wait to hear Pope’s thoughts on Missouri, check out the latest episode of KSR’s Sources Say. Jack Pilgrim, Shawn Smith, and I talked about Senior Night, the SEC Tournament, and much more. I also had the opportunity to briefly interview Koby Brea as we talked more about Senior Night, Zach Tow receiving his jersey, how he earned the nickname Fuego, and more.

Dive in below to hear the entire episode, or come back to it later after you read the rest of this morning’s news and notes.

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Kentucky WBB arrived in Greenville, SC

With an SEC Tournament double-bye in hand, Kentucky women’s basketball won’t play until Friday, but the team arrived in Greenville, SC yesterday and will find out its opponent later today. UK will play the winner of 12-seed Georgia and 5-seed Oklahoma on Friday at 2:30 p.m. EST on ESPN. Georgia and Oklahoma will go head-to-head today at 1:30 p.m. EST on the SEC Network if you want a sneak peek at the Wildcats’ opening round matchup.

Kentucky has already beaten the Bulldogs twice this season and also knocked off Oklahoma on the road. But the Sooners are dangerous right now, having not lost a single contest since falling to the Wildcats. Oklahoma brings a seven-game winning streak into today’s game.

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Coaching changes on the way?

A couple of notable pieces of news related to coaching searches in connection with Kentucky surfaced yesterday. We’ll start with the most important one. UK football associate head coach Vince Marrow reportedly interviewed for the Bowling Green head coaching job. Football Scoop reports Bowling Green held job interviews with Marrow, Mercer head coach Mike Jacobs, and Minnesota co-defensive coordinator Nick Monroe. It’s not often we see head coaching jobs pop up in early March, but this will be one to pay attention to for the BBN.

The other, less interesting coaching tidbit is former Kentucky men’s basketball assistant Jai Lucas reportedly accepting the head coaching position at Miami (FL). The 36-year-old will replace Jim Larranaga in Coral Gables. Lucas is expected to leave Duke, where he is a current assistant, at the end of the regular season.

KSR “RoadTrip” vs. LSU

Let’s take one last look at the Wildcats’ 31-point win over LSU before shifting our focus to Missouri. KSR’s Steven Peake captured all of the sights and sounds from Kentucky’s Senior Night victory. He also interviewed fans about their favorite players and moments from the season and captured Pope’s conversation with Big Blue Nation after the win — plus the seniors saying goodbye.

Mitch Barnhart talked football with the Herald-Leader

UK Athletic Director Mitch Barnhart called Kentucky football’s 4-8 finish in 2024 a “one year blip” in a conversation this week with John Hale of the Herald-Leader.

“I’m confident that (Stoops) loves his place. He’s the all-time winningest coach here, and that’s saying something. There’s been a lot of people who tried hard here and couldn’t sustain it and couldn’t work at it,” Barnhart said.

“… A one-year blip is not what I would call ‘not sustaining it.’ Now, if we go two or three more, a couple more years, and we’re still not back where we want to be, sure, then you have to have a conversation about, what are we trying to get to here? And how do we do that? But he’s absolutely engaged with our guys. Staff is over there, working hard at it, and we’ve got a good group of guys coming in.”

The schedule only gets harder in 2025 — the eighth-toughest in the country, in fact — as Mark Stoops and company look to bounce back this fall.

[Herald-Leader: Mitch Barnhart assesses UK Football, “We’ve got to find a way to recover.”]