This year's November signing period, which begins Wednesday, has a father-son quality for Kentucky.
In Stacey Poole Jr., UK will sign the son of one of Florida's better players of 20 years ago. Father says Kentucky will get the better of the two.
"He's more skilled than I am," said Stacey Poole Sr., who described himself as "a guy who could put up numbers. He brings more to the table than that. He's more refined than I am, a lot headier than I was."
In terms of reputation coming to college, the apple did not fall far from the tree. The son, like the father, is billed as a driver who needs work on his perimeter shot.
Father saw son coming to a better situation to improve. "I didn't improve much as a player," the elder Poole said.
To be fair, Stacey Poole Sr., had the misfortune of playing for three coaches in his four seasons at Florida. Norm Sloan gave way to Don DeVoe who yielded to Lon Kruger. If that wasn't difficult enough, the elder Poole had to overcome more than one serious injury. It's all the more remarkable that he became a 1,000-point scorer.
Kentucky presents his son a high-profile program that guarantees high-quality competition.
"What other program is bigger?" the elder Poole said. "Younger guys have seen Kentucky when they've been down the last couple years. You'd think Carolina, Duke and Kansas (were the best programs). I told him, if you know what I know, there's no better program. No better place to play."
ESPN's recruiting coordinator, Paul Biancardi, spoke highly of the UK-bound Poole during a teleconference Wednesday.
After noting that ESPN rated Poole at No. 50 or 51, Biancardi said, "He could be better than that. He's coming on strong, 6-4, 6-5 and built like a man. He fits the dribble-drive to a T. From 17 feet in, he can really dominate."
Biancardi dismissed the importance of Kentucky having only one commitment in place for the high school class of 2010.
"It's not how quickly (commitments come)," he said. "But that you get who you want."
Analyst Brick Oettinger of the Prep Stars recruiting service said that UK was in good position to sign one or more top prospects. Among them are forward Tobias Harris, point guards Brandon Knight or Josh Selby and wings Terrance Jones, Jelan Kendrick and Doron Lamb.
"He's going after the right guys," Oettinger said of John Calipari. "The best kids and being a national championship contender. It all goes to recruiting the best talent, and it's what they've been doing."
Yankees, UK
Right-thinking UK fans should have been rooting for the New York Yankees to beat the Philadelphia Phillies in the World Series.
Reader Chris Aldridge explained why. "Did you know that all seven of UK's NCAA basketball titles have either preceded a Yankees World Series title in the fall or followed one in the spring?" he wrote in an e-mail.
Aldridge also sent a list that showed UK's national championships in 1949, 1958, 1996 and 1998 came in the same calendar year as the Yankees winning the World Series. And UK's national championships in 1948, 1951 and 1978 came in the spring after the Yankees won World Series.
Note: The Yankees are so dominant that UK's national championships in 1951 and 1978 came both before and after New York won the World Series.
So Aldridge saw the Yankees beating the Phillies this year as a good sign.
"Former coach Billy Gillispie's 2008-09 Wildcats weren't even in the running last spring, breaking a 17-year streak of qualifying for the NCAA Tournament," he wrote. "So could that mean that John Calipari's No. 4-ranked Wildcats will add an eighth championship banner to the Rupp Arena rafters in the spring of 2010? It'll be fun to watch it play out over the next five months."
Of course, there were many years the Yankees won the series and UK did not win national championships. But let's not confuse the issue.
Aldridge is a 1988 graduate of UK's School of Journalism.
Aldridge lives in Shelbyville, and since 2005 has worked in public relations for Kentucky Agriculture Commissioner Richie Farmer at the Department of Agriculture in Frankfort.
Babbling Brooks?
The November issue of Basketball Times includes a two-page story on No. 1 Kansas. Deep in the story Kansas Coach Bill Self voices his objection to a comment by UK football coach Rich Brooks.
According to the story, Brooks had tweeted that UK's basketball and football teams felt a kinship unlike at another school. That thinly veiled reference was to Kansas, where some basketball and football players fought earlier this fall.
"I'm only an expert on our program," The Basketball Times quotes Self. "I'm not an expert on anybody else's. I'm not saying our guys were right. We put ourselves in a bad position with the football players. There's no doubt about that.
"But for somebody else to comment on it from the outside, in this business, is almost laughable. But people do that.
"For me, personally, I would never be an expert on what's going on in somebody else's program because it's not always the way it appears."
Coal, Cats, compromise
Reader Evan Wisniewski offered a compromise on the contentious issue of UK building a new "dormitory" for the basketball team and naming it Wildcat Coal Lodge.
To review: Those who donated $7 million for construction of a new lodge made the donation contingent on the word "coal" being in the building's name. Ignoring protests about an encroachment of commercialization and salute to 18th century fuel technology, UK accepted the money and the condition.
Wisniewski suggested a compromise.
"Taking a page from Bill Clinton who argued what the meaning of the word 'is' is, I'd argue that the university would meet the agreement if they actually made the sign naming the lodge out of coal," he wrote in an e-mail. "Surely that meets the definition, because coal would be 'in' the name of the facility. You could still name it after Joe B. Hall. I think if you can make a fireplace out of coal, you can just as easily make a sign out of coal."
The fireplace in the existing lodge is made out of coal.
Wisniewski, 57, lives in Georgetown. He is retired from a job with the Federal Highway Administration.
"I've lived here the last 12 years," he said in a follow-up e-mail. "Like anyone else, if you live in Kentucky long enough, you have to cheer for the Cats."
Wisniewski, whose grandfather mined coal in West Virginia, made quite a debut as a Kentuckian. He moved to Kentucky in 1998, the year Scott County won the state championship, Georgetown College won the NAIA national championship and UK won the NCAA Tournament.
"I knew I was in basketball heaven," he wrote.
Losses envisioned
Kentucky's dependence on freshmen will lead to losses this season, two ESPN analysts said on a teleconference Wednesday. But the experience those players gain through the season should make UK a formidable team in the post-season.
"They will get beat along the way on a number of occasions because someone is more experienced," said Fran Fraschilla, a college basketball commentator for ESPN. "But by March 1, they should be a very, very good basketball team capable of getting to the Final Four and winning it."
Paul Biancardi, ESPN's director of recruiting, saw the Kentucky freshmen hitting a wall.
"Talent will win games for them," he said, "but there's going to be a point in the season when as freshmen they'll hit that mental wall. They'll be there physically, but mentally they won't show up.
"And you'll see that against experienced teams, especially in the SEC. That will come back and haunt Kentucky on those nights."
Both analysts lauded Kentucky's freshmen as superior talents.
Fraschilla noted how the top-level competition played in high school and the AAU circuit makes it easier for high school stars to adjust to the college level.
From watching Kentucky practice in September, Fraschilla said he saw the players' good attitude and willingness to learn as signs of a smooth adjustment.
"The guy that jumps out at me in terms of attitude and work ethic is John Wall," said Fraschilla, who added that former UK star Tony Delk put in a good word for Wall. "When Tony Delk tells you someone has a great attitude, you can kind of take that to the bank."
Patterson 'experiment'
UK star Patrick Patterson will attempt to play a different style of basketball this season. Of course, he'll be facing the basket more and playing with a higher level of talent.
That should mean Patterson will not have to almost single-handedly battle opposing teams' front lines around the basket, two ESPN analysts said.
"I'm anxious to see how the experiment works," analyst Fran Fraschilla said.
Fraschilla noted how Patterson will have to adjust.
"He'll no longer have three guys hanging over him when he posts," Fraschilla said.
Paul Biancardi, ESPN's director of recruiting, noted that he expects UK to run plays to get Patterson the ball in the low post and use him in pick-and-roll situations.
"They're going to move him around the floor as much as they can," Biancardi said. "He's going to score from different areas of the floor."
Liggins sits
Sophomore DeAndre Liggins never left the bench during Kentucky's two exhibition victories. After the first, Coach John Calipari suggested he might bench other players just to see how they react. But in the second exhibition, Liggins was the only UK player other than the injured Eric Bledsoe not to get on the floor.
When asked why, Calipari paused and said, "I'm going to talk about the guys I'm playing. I'll never throw kids under the bus. I'll take responsibility. Let's talk about the guys who played."
Big black country?
When it comes to attire, Tennessee Coach Bruce Pearl has been a traditionalist. He honors his most famous predecessor, Ray Mears, by wearing an orange blazer for games against Kentucky and Vanderbilt. He had the Vols again wear candy-striped warm-ups. He passed on the trend of wearing uniforms that are not the school colors.
But the latter may change. After watching fans embrace the black uniforms worn by UT's football team last weekend, Pearl is reconsidering.
"The fact that the guys all like it is a factor,'' Pearl told the Knoxville News-Sentinel. "I don't think anything was done (Saturday) to dishonor our school's tradition. This will always be Big Orange Country.
"I think some folks need to understand that it was entertaining to see us in those uniforms, and to see the response of the crowd and the students."
The black uniforms may have helped get a commitment from five-star basketball prospect Kevin Ware, who attended the football game.
Ware told the News-Sentinel that he thought the football team's black jerseys were "cool," and that it was "very exciting" to see Tennessee in that color on Halloween night.
Tennessee basketball players are thinking about which home game to wear black.
"I think we should do a 'blackout' with our fans for the Kansas game," Scotty Hopson told the News-Sentinel. The Vols play Kansas in January.
Former UT All-American Chris Lofton likes the idea, too.
"They looked good on the football team," said Lofton, who is playing in Spain, "and I think I would have looked good in a black uniform with my black-and-orange adidas shoes."
Pearl said black uniforms for his team have yet to be ordered, but it is up for discussion.
Happy birthday
To Billy Gillispie. The former UK coach turned 50 on Saturday.
