Mark Pope explains benefits of expanding to 40-game regular season

Mark Pope is all about expanding the college basketball regular season.

Back in December, he brought up the idea of stretching the schedule out to 40 games prior to the postseason. It’s his first big-picture idea to change the current landscape of college hoops as Kentucky head coach, and one that could feasibly happen in the near future if the right people push for it.

A couple of months later, it’s a topic still fresh on his mind.

“I just think it’s time to expand our season out to a 40-game season,” Pope said during a press conference last week when asked hoq quickly this season has gone by. “Like, it should be a 40-game season, especially with all the change and the turnover and the lack of continuity of teams, and also with revenue sharing and everything else, it doesn’t make any sense that we’re at a 31-game season. It makes no sense. And so I’m a massive advocate, maybe the only one in the world. But we need to expand the season to 40 games. Even for the guys that go on to be pros, it gives them a better sense.”

The thought process behind Pope’s idea isn’t difficult to understand. More games = more money. That’s massively important in this new NIL era. But his thinking goes far beyond simple dollar signs. The benefits extend to fans, players, and coaches. He’s all for more exhibition games, more non conference games, and more conference games — whatever it takes to add another nine games to every regular season schedule.

“I would love to see all the above,” Pope said when asked to explain the exact changes he would like to reach a 40-game schedule. “I’m so excited about this freedom to have Division I opponents in exhibition. I don’t mind going to four exhibition games now with the freedom to do that. I think it gives you the opportunity to really grow and test your team in a great way. Because all of us now are trying to collect so much data on our team in just a matter of a couple months and so I think the more games we get, the better product we’re going to have as we go.

“So I’d love to see that, and I’d love the non conference to to have a couple more games, because it gives you the freedom to go schedule better games. All of us right now, as athletic departments are going to be more and more financially challenged as the revenue sharing, if the settlement goes through. And so it’s a way for us to actually increase revenue significantly and have the freedom to actually go find a couple more great games that are really impactful.”

A notable downside could be it creates the possibility for more injuries, something Kentucky is already dealing with in a 31-game season, but you could flip that argument into saying it creates more in-season time for recovery. If the goal is to play basketball beyond college, the majority of professional leagues play far more than 40 games in a single season.

With how often rosters are changing in the transfer portal era, it’s tougher to build teams with the same group of players for more than a couple of years. More games allows the coaches to figure out how the pieces work and the players opportunity to build chemistry.

“I think it makes sense to add a couple games into the conference regular season,” Pope continued. “It gives some conferences a chance to get to more of an even schedule in conference, which I think is a bonus. I think it’s great when you can play home and away with every team every year. It just adds that real spice and a continuity to conferences. Some of the conferences are too big to probably get to that number, but the more of those home and homes that you get in conference, I think it makes conferences better. I think it’s better for fans and better for teams and better for rivalries.

“And so I think all those things are important. Every study that you look at since the beginning of time will show that our students are better students during the season than they are out of the season because they have a schedule that they’re locked into. And so I feel like it’s a it’s a no-miss scenario. I think it would be really positive, and I’m advocating for it — in case I didn’t say that already.”

It might not happen within the next calendar year, but don’t be shocked if an expansion to the regular season becomes a topic of discussion sooner rather than later.