SEC coaches give their thoughts and perspective on Kenny Brooks' first season at Kentucky

This weekend, KSR was in Greenville, SC for the Women’s SEC Tournament. Unfortunately, Kentucky’s run would be very short-lived as the Cats fell to 5-seed Oklahoma 69-65 in the Quarterfinals on Friday —their first and only game in the tournament after fighting to get the double bye.

The loss to the Sooners stings, but then again, it’s not like Oklahoma is a bad team. Just like Kentucky, they’re a projected 3-seed according to the latest Bracketology, and they’re also the No. 10 team in the country in the AP Poll. Needless to say, Friday’s loss sucked, but Kentucky proved once again that they can hang with the best of the best in the four-point defeat.

Part of that is because of the position that Kenny Brooks has put Kentucky in this season. As mentioned, he coached the Cats to an SEC Tournament double bye, and to this point, a 22-7 overall record. That’s a pretty good turnaround for the program considering Kentucky won 24 total games in the two years prior.

While KSR was on site at the SEC Tournament, we asked some of the other coaches from around the league about what they thought of Brooks’ first season at the helm in Lexington. We spoke with South Carolina’s Dawn Staley, LSU’s Kim Mulkey and Texas’ Vic Schaefer during their postgame press conferences on Saturday.

Staley was very high on the job Brooks has done, mainly considering the fact that he had to assemble an entire team with players from an array of places — high school, overseas, other schools and even the JUCO level.

“He’s done a tremendous job,” Staley said. “It’s hard to be one of the top four in this league in the regular season. A brand new team, like I didn’t know all of it, but I was listening to the commentators just talk about bringing in 11 new players and getting them to play on one accord. They’re really good players, but they don’t play as cohesive without coaching. So, he’s done a great job of getting them to commit to it, and when you got a point guard like Georgia Amoore, that helps put the glue between all the pieces to make it fit well.”

Mulkey shared a similar sentiment to Staley, noting that the pieces Brooks brought with him from Virginia Tech helped him greatly. She’s coached against him several times before, when both of them were at different places, in both the regular season and in the NCAA Tournament. They’ve squared off in some big-time games, and Mulkey knows that Brooks has Kentucky ready for the big-time games on deck.

“Heck of a turnaround, right,” the LSU head coach told KSR. “He made them really, really good really, really fast. The portal does that, and a lot of those players came with him from Virginia Tech. It didn’t surprise me. Good coach. Those players that came with him know the system — and what a year he had, and has an opportunity to possibly host the first and second round game, and that’s great for the SEC.”

When Kentucky played Texas, the most important and impactful thing to come from that game had absolutely nothing to do with the scoreboard or the stat sheet. Instead, it was Kentucky’s Pink Out game, honoring and raising awareness for people affected by breast cancer. It was revealed before the game that Brooks’ wife, Chrissy, was cancer free, and Schaefer has a son, Logan, who is a survivor of cancer as well.

Following the game, the two coaches shared a moment in which they exchanged words of encouragement to each other. Since then, Schaefer has had the upmost respect for Brooks.

As Staley and Mulkey pointed out, for Kentucky, their success begins and ends with All-SEC First Team point guard and SEC Newcomer of the Year Georgia Amoore. However, when you pair someone as talented as Amoore with an excellent cast of teammates and elite coaching, that can do dividends for your program.

“I think he’s certainly done a great job there,” Schaefer explained. “He knows how to build a team, and when you start with Georgia Amoore, that’s a great place to start. You have to give her credit for coming with him, and then he’s got some really good pieces around her. So, he had a great year finishing in the top four in the league, and that’s hard to do in this league. Kenny’s a great coach. I don’t know him real well — gotten to know him a little bit, and obviously, we shared some special messages with each other when I was there because it was Breast Cancer Awareness night that night — but a lot of respect. I’ve watched his teams from afar, and again, if you finished in the top four in this league, you’ve done something.”

Now, Brooks looks to add to what he’s already done in his first year in Lexington by leading Kentucky to a deep run in the NCAA Tournament.