Mark Pope 'digs the vibe' with new staff, potential to be 'really, really special'

Mark Pope had one job when he took over as head coach at Kentucky: hire a staff to help him build a roster. It started with BYU’s Cody Fueger, then Jason Hart formerly of the NBA G League Ignite, followed quickly by 18-year head coach Mark Fox in an associate role. Then came the home run swing, hitting on Baylor’s Alvin Brooks III, who has been named associate head coach as Pope’s right-hand man.

Uneasiness with the roster crept in among the fanbase as just three players had signed on through two weeks with Pope in Lexington. The head coach knew, though, the core staff needed to be in place before the dominoes could fall with personnel elsewhere.

“I knew that we had to put this staff together really, really fast, OK?” Pope said on KSR Monday. “I kind of zeroed in on a short list of guys and ended up with, actually, the four guys that I was desperate to get. And then we’re taking a little pause.”

That pause was to focus on the portal and striking while the iron was hot with all hands on deck. And then over the course of a 72-hour period, Kentucky added signatures from San Diego State’s Lamont Butler, Oklahoma’s Otega Oweh and Wake Forest’s Andrew Carr — with plenty more to come.

It was a calculated effort that paid off. And then when the roster is set, he’ll shift his attention back to that final assistant spot and the rest of his support staff.

“I have some more people to add to the staff but I need to take a little pause right now and just kind of see how our pieces are fitting together and then we’ll go light-speed again,” he said. “It’s like a surgical pause where you get a chance to breathe it in and see exactly where you are and what you need. I imagine as we get to that place, there will be a lot of things that come into play.”

There is more work to do, but that doesn’t mean he’s not fired up about the current results he’s getting with the four-man group now. Seeing them all work together for the first time this weekend was everything he had hoped for and more in terms of balancing personalities, ideas and knowledge.

It’s a group that has seen a ton of high-level basketball and knows its stuff, that’s for sure.

“I love the staff so far. It’s probably the most eclectic staff I’ve had, for sure. And I think guys are not just bringing unique strengths and unique dimensions to the staff, but also bringing them from wildly different categories,” Pope told KSR. “The breadth of what we have on this staff has got me super excited. The four of us have only been together now fro 72 hours all together in the same room. We’ve been recruiting so hard that we’re spending a lot of time together in situations where it’s just flowing conversation and I dig it.”

It’s early, obviously — again, they’ve been together a matter of days — but the early returns are extremely positive. Pope has had his fair share of pinch-me moments seeing his vision come to life as the head coach at Kentucky.

He hopes the long-term results match what he’s seen thus far.

“I was in the room with Coach (Cody) Fueger a long time and then Jason Hart, we played together with the Milwaukee Bucks, I’ve known him forever and love him. And watching those two personalities bounce off each other, the room was electric and I was just sitting back like, ‘This is exactly what this is supposed to be,'” Pope said. “That’s just one example of those guys making each other better and I love it. I dig the vibe right now. It’s got to be great, our job is to be great and in the early, early stages, there’s some synergy here with these guys that’s going to be really, really special.”

There is more where that comes from.