Will Mark Pope pull the green light if shots aren't falling? 'Yeah, we don't do that.'

Kentucky is going to shoot the ball with Mark Pope running the show. And they’ll keep shooting, and shooting, and shooting. There will be hot streaks. There will be droughts. But through it all, Pope won’t change his strategy — as long as the shots are earned, not forced, at least.

“When you prep to play us, you have got to guard the three-point line,” Pope said last Thursday.

We’ve seen a little bit of that already during the exhibitions. Kentucky started off slow from beyond the arc in both preseason games before picking it up the rest of the way. UK was 3-12 from deep against Kentucky Wesleyan before finishing 21-42. UK was 2-13 against Minnesota State before finishing 13-37.

The makes came in flurries.

Pope has plenty of proven shooters on the roster, enough so that shooting droughts shouldn’t last too long. It’s why he’ll never pull the green light from any of his players. The math says that those shots will eventually fall. When they do, it can spark a huge run that blows a game wide open — exactly what happened in the preseason.

“Yeah, we don’t do that,” Pope said when asked if he’d tell a shooter to stop shooting. “It’s gonna drive you guys all crazy. Are you really? Nah, it’s part of the game. So guess what, if you’re trying to scout us out and someone hasn’t shot well the last couple of games, watch out.

“Every time you miss a shot, you’re one shot closer to making one. That’s just the truth. That’s the data, that’s the numbers. You kinda got to pick your poison.”

Even when it comes to someone like Brandon Garrison, Kentucky’s 6-foot-11 sophomore center, Pope’s philosophy with shooting remains the same. Garrison didn’t attempt a single three-pointer last season at Oklahoma State, but Pope is encouraging him to take more in 2024-25. He has a smooth-looking jumper, he just needs to see one go through the net.

“BG is 0-3 (from three) right now in our exhibition games. Chances are he’s going to make the fourth one because he’s better than a 25 percent shooter, so you better guard him,” Pope said. “It’s that staying power of trusting how this game is and the karma is, especially if we earn these shots. The one BG took the other night was perfect. It was wide open. Ball got to the paint, got kicked out, and I want him to take that shot every time. He’s gonna make a lot of them.”

The only player on this roster who Pope might want to “discourage” from shooting threes is 7-footer Amari Williams, who is just 8-26 from deep throughout his four-year college career and doesn’t exactly have the prettiest-looking shot. Plus, Williams is most effective operating as a playmaking big man. But if he’s wide open from the top of the key and the shot clock is running low, don’t be surprised if even he is chucking up a couple of threes.

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