Mark Pope eager to see Kentucky get 'exposed' against another team: 'Show us what we're not doing well.'

Mark Pope wants Kentucky to get exposed. It’s why he’s so excited to finally pit his guys against someone other than the blue team or the white team. He wants to see exactly which areas his team needs to improve upon going into the regular season — his debut run as the program’s new head coach.

Pope has learned plenty about his first Kentucky team over the last few months of practice, but there’s no better way to see exactly what he has than by having another team come in and unearth the cracks. Those opportunities are coming quickly.

“The fun thing is where you get exposed,” Pope said at SEC Media Days. “You play against each other, you’re playing a similar style because everybody is playing the same style in our gym, so you’re just hungry to get exposed.

“So show us what we don’t know yet about our team. We have two exhibitions against two teams. We’re playing the defending national champ Division II team, and so we’re going to get exposed. We’re just hungry.”

Kentucky’s first unofficial exhibition happens this Friday with the Blue-White Preseason Event at Memorial Coliseum. But that won’t tell the story that Pope wants to read. It’ll basically be a publicized 5-on-5 practice session meant more for the consumption of fans. The two preseason games that follow against Kentucky Wesleyan and Minnesota State Mankato (the aforementioned defending DII champs) will be the first real time Pope can actually see what he has on the hardwood going into 2024-25.

“I have a group, like I said, that’s humble and curious, and we’re actually dying to get in the film room and be like, okay, show us what we’re not doing well, where are the holes and cracks in what we do so we can go fix them and build them back up,” Pope added. “And that’s what you get from playing other teams.

“We’re really eager. We’re at the point now where we’re really eager to go face some opponents because we need to be a great team by the time March comes around, and you need to learn that and take in all that information and learn the principles where we can combat the little holes that we have, so that’s what outside games do.”

Although the competitive spirit of the players won’t let them think of it as being “exposed”, transfer guard Lamont Butler still understands exactly what Pope is saying. The only way to learn and grow is through experience. None of Kentucky’s 12 scholarship pieces have played together in college before.

Butler doesn’t plan on him or his teammates being exposed in these exhibitions, but any matchup against someone else is one that will help the Wildcats.

“I think (Pope) just wants us to go out there and actually get some time against some other people,” Butler said. “Play against other people. Always early in the season, there’s bumps and bruises in the world. But we’re gonna go out there and play hard. I don’t how much exposing there’s gonna be but any game is an opportunity to get better and have fun.”

Watch the latest Mark Pope press conference on the KSR YouTube Channel.