As Mitch Barnhart’s UK tenure ends, a look back at his best and worst hires
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- Mitch Barnhart served 24 years as Kentucky athletics director and transformed facilities.
- Barnhart hired 34 varsity coaches and led hiring across nearly every sport.
- His tenure included major successes and high-profile failed hires in marquee sports.
Polarizing might be the most accurate description of Mitch Barnhart’s 24-year tenure as Kentucky athletics director.
The department that Barnhart leaves on his final day on the job Tuesday looks nothing like the one he inherited in 2002. Almost every athletic facility on campus has received multiple facelifts. There was a time when men’s basketball was the only consistent winner on campus, but Barnhart set a standard that Kentucky would be competitive in all sports.
“Mitch has been a standard-bearer in this industry for athletic directors,” J Batt, Barnhart’s replacement, told the Herald-Leader. “...Mitch is a legend in our business, and it means the world to be following him.”
But there were missteps along the way, too.
Barnhart hired 34 varsity coaches (plus two cheerleading and dance coaches after those teams were moved under athletics department oversight). He hired at least one coach in every sport but rifle, a program Harry Mullins has led since 1987.
Included in that group are the most successful coaches in almost every Olympic sport. He hired a national champion in men’s basketball and the football program’s all-time wins leader.
But his hiring record is weighed down by failed hires in the most visible sports. Both his most successful men’s basketball and football coaching hires were either fired or left amid growing fan frustration.
Even in his final days on the job, Barnhart’s hiring record remains incomplete. How men’s basketball coach Mark Pope, women’s basketball coach Kenny Brooks and football coach Will Stein perform in the coming years could dramatically swing the evaluation in either direction.
But with Barnhart’s Kentucky tenure in its final week, here is a look at his five best and worst coaching hires.
Best hires
Craig Skinner (volleyball)
Skinner enters his 22nd season just three wins shy of 500. He won a national championship in 2021 and reached the title game last season. Skinner has won the past nine SEC championships and has reached the NCAA Tournament in every season as head coach. As volleyball’s popularity continues to grow, Skinner has put Kentucky in the national spotlight.
John Calipari (men’s basketball)
No Barnhart hire is harder to judge than Calipari, whom Barnhart declined to even interview when the job opened in 2008 but became much more attractive after the dreadful Billy Gillispie era. Calipari’s run from 2009 to 2015, which included a 2012 national championship, was among the best in the program’s illustrious history, but he suffered two first-round upsets to double-digit seeds in his final three seasons. The relationship between Barnhart and Calipari never appeared comfortable, but Barnhart ultimately gets credit for making the hire that returned the program to the top of the sport.
Mark Stoops (football)
Had Stoops left Kentucky for Texas A&M in 2023, he likely would have been remembered as Barnhart’s best hire. Stoops led Kentucky to eight straight bowl games and two 10-win seasons (though the 2021 wins were later vacated by NCAA probation), proving the traditional SEC cellar-dweller could be relevant on a national level as success in football became essential to the department’s financial health. But Stoops’ tenure cratered with the advent of the transfer portal and players’ ability to be paid for their name, image and likeness. After back-to-back losing seasons, Barnhart fired Stoops at a cost of $37.7 million in December.
Edrick Floreal (track and field)
At his 2012 introductory news conference, Floreal declared, “Sucking is not something I want to ease out of.” He made good on that promise and more by turning Kentucky into a hurdles power that eventually produced multiple world record holders and Olympic gold medalists. Lonnie Greene deserves credit for building on Floreal’s success after his departure for Texas in 2018, but Floreal established the foundation for “Hurdles U.”
Rachel Lawson (softball)
It’s easy to forget Lawson is actually the second softball coach Barnhart hired. His first hire, Eileen Schmidt, was just 61-108 in three seasons, but Lawson proved Kentucky could be relevant in softball. She has won 587 games and led UK to 16 NCAA Tournament appearances, eight super regionals and the 2014 College World Series. Lawson appears to be facing some of the same challenges as Stoops did in adjusting to the new college sports landscape, though, with a three-year downturn culminating in a disastrous 24 consecutive SEC losses last season. What happens next in softball will be a telling test case for how Batt views nonrevenue sports.
Worst hires
Lars Jorgensen (swimming and diving)
The Jorgensen-coached UK women’s swimming and diving team won an SEC championship for the first time in program history in 2021, but no hire put a bigger stain on Barnhart’s tenure than Jorgensen. In 2023, Jorgensen was suspended amid an investigation into NCAA rules violations regarding practice time. Two swimmers then filed a lawsuit in April 2024 alleging Jorgensen sexually harassed and assaulted them and a third woman during their separate times with the swim program. Barnhart is a codefendant in that lawsuit. The case is currently scheduled to go to trial in April 2027.
Billy Gillispie (men’s basketball)
When Tubby Smith left Kentucky for Minnesota in 2007, Barnhart flubbed his first chance to hire a coach in the school’s most important sport. After being turned down by multiple candidates, Barnhart turned to Gillispie, who had just led Texas A&M to an upset of Louisville in an NCAA Tournament game played in Rupp Arena. Gillispie lost at home to Gardner Webb in his second game and did little better from there. After UK missed the NCAA Tournament for the first time since returning from the disaster of NCAA probation in the early 1990s, Barnhart fired Gillispie after just two seasons on the job.
Joker Phillips (football)
The hire that perhaps most defines Barnhart’s tenure was his pick of Rich Brooks to lead the football program in his first year as athletics director and subsequent loyalty to Brooks as the program struggled due to the effects of probation. When Brooks led UK back to postseason play and powerhouse programs began pursuing Phillips, then UK’s offensive coordinator, it made sense to name him coach-in-waiting. But the choice to promote Phillips after Brooks retired backfired with three straight losing seasons. Barnhart fired Phillips after a 2-10 record in 2012.
Ian Carry (women’s soccer)
Barnhart eventually fired each of his first two women’s soccer coaching hires, but Jon Lipsitz at least finished his eight-season tenure with a winning record. After firing Lipsitz, Barnhart chose to promote Carry from assistant coach to lead the program. Carry became the rare nonrevenue sports coach to be fired during a season when Barnhart relieved him of his duties during his fifth season on the job. He finished his UK tenure with a 27-52-8 record.
Kyra Elzy (women’s basketball)
Barnhart had few options but to promote Elzy to interim head coach when Matthew Mitchell resigned due to health reasons just days before the start of the 2020-21 season. When Elzy led UK to the second round of the NCAA Tournament in her first season, it made perfect sense to make her the full-time coach. The mistake came when Barnhart awarded Elzy a contract extension after an improbable run to an SEC Tournament title in 2022. Kentucky needed the SEC’s automatic bid to reach the NCAA Tournament that year. Elzy went 24-49 over the next two seasons before being fired.