Calipari: We're regular people

By Valarie Honeycutt Spears / vhoneycutt@herald-leader.com

Mark Cornelison | Staff / ALL

John Calipari , jokingly, introduced his son Bradley,12, as his 12 yr old UK commitment who could really shoot, as he was introduced as the new head basketball coach at the University of Kentucky on Wednesday April 1, 2009 Lexington ,Kentucky. Photo by Mark Cornelison | Staff

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Do you approve of coach Calipari's $31.2 million, 8-year compensation package?

John Calipari is the grandson of a West Virginia coal miner who suffered from black lung.

Ellen Calipari, according to published reports, has her own table saw and router. She cleans her own house, and playing Guitar Hero is her favorite thing to do with her three children.

"We're regular people," John Calipari assured Kentucky fans Wednesday during a news conference to announce his hiring.

The Sports Illustrated 2008-2009 National Coach of the Year says that when he starts giving himself too much credit, he needs only go home, where his wife tells him, "Stop patting yourself on the back. You'll break your arm."

Ellen Calipari told the Herald-Leader that while her husband stays in Lexington to start his new job, she will go back to Memphis for a short time so her 12-year-old son, Brad, can finish the school year.

"My kids come first," she told reporters in Memphis last year.

On Wednesday, Ellen Calipari also said she needs to return to Memphis to oversee the sale of their home.

"We've got a house for sale and one to look for," she said. "It all takes time. We would like to get here as soon as we can. We've got to figure all that out."

She said the family hasn't begun looking for a home in Lexington yet, having arrived in town just Tuesday night.

In Memphis, the Caliparis lived in a 7,000-square-foot home that sits on 1.27 acres. They hosted fund-raisers and booster-club barbecues at that home, which they bought for $1.49 million in 2000.

University of Kentucky Athletics Director Mitch Barnhart praised Calipari for donating thousands of dollars to worthy causes and creating the Calipari Family Foundation for Children, which supports various charities. Ellen Calipari tutored elementary schoolchildren, her husband said at Wednesday's news conference.

Calipari promised that same kind of commitment in Lexington.

"We will become involved in this community," he said.

The new coach asked that people in Kentucky have patience with him and his wife as they learn about their new home and its people: "We don't know anyone."

Daughter Megan, 19, is ahead of her parents in that area. Megan, who attended the press conference, said that some of her high school friends attend UK; by Wednesday morning, she had already met some new friends in Lexington.

A freshman at the University of Memphis, Megan said she will transfer to UK and major in psychology and Spanish. She expects to study speech and language pathology when she goes to graduate school.

"I'm really excited," Megan said about moving to Lexington. "It's been crazy. But for the most part, people are nice."

Will she be living in the new house that her parents buy in Lexington?

"I don't live with my parents in Memphis," she said. "I'll be apartment-shopping."

Kentucky fans were also introduced to the youngest Calipari child during Wednesday's news conference.

Asked whether he would honor commitments that Billy Gillispie already made to players entering UK in 2012, Calipari said he would address each case individually.

And then Calipari paused. "We already have a commitment from a 12-year-old," he told the crowd that gathered to welcome him. "Stand up, 12-year-old."

Laughing, son Brad rose to his feet.

In an interview, Brad said that he does expect to play basketball in Lexington. And he said he fully expected to participate in community service projects. In one effort in Memphis, Brad said, that meant volunteering with his mother, "picking up trash off the street."

Barnhart said the Caliparis' older daughter, Erin, didn't attend the news conference because she was headed to graduate school.

Erin was described on a 2007 UMass Web site as a basketball player and neuroscience major.

Though not in Lexington, Erin, 22, didn't escape the frenzy. Her photograph was already posted on some fan blogs Wednesday.

Reach Valarie Honeycutt Spears at (859) 231-3409 or 1-800-950-6397.