Mark Pope tests his players with scouting report pop quizzes during practice

Mark Pope is quickly becoming known for his intricate approach to coaching basketball. He might as well be a professor trying to teach the game to his students. Pop quizzes are already a part of his weekly teaching routine.

“He will kind of test you, which is a little different for sure,” Kentucky junior guard Otega Oweh said on Monday.

Testing his players has become a regular part of Pope’s practices at Kentucky. He mostly tests them on the scouting report for the next opponent. At any moment, Pope can pick out one of his Wildcats and ask them to describe a player on the opposing team — not always the player they’ll be defending, either — by using just three words.

“The main one is to describe who we’re guarding in three words,” Kentucky fifth-year center Amari Williams said. “It’s kind of tough to describe someone using three — and you can’t even say ‘um’ either. That counts as a word. I feel like that’s the toughest one. But going into that practice we’ve all got one on our mind just in case our name gets called.”

“In shootaround, we’ll all just line up and whoever your matchup is, or it doesn’t have to be your matchup, (Pope will) just ask you something like ‘Give us three words to describe this guy’ and we’ll have to do that,” Oweh added. “Kinda like school a little bit.”

Pope’s pop quizzes help keep the players on their toes and involved in the scouting reports. For Williams, he says film sessions at Kentucky are “definitely a lot longer” than they were at his previous school Drexel. When watching film, coaches and players closely monitor the opposing team’s actions and player tendencies, dissecting as best they can what the other side will bring to the matchup.

The behind-the-scenes work has paid off though. Kentucky is ranked fourth in the country with a Top 30 offense and defense. UK has yet to drop a game this season. Williams says a lot of Lamont Butler and Otega Oweh‘s steals in the passing lanes have been a result of in-depth film work.

“It’s important for sure,” Williams added. “I feel like a lot of the actions, we were able to stop in the flow of the game just by knowing what they do. It’s helped us win seven games so far, so we’re gonna continue to do that.”

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