Calipari leads video tour of UK locker room renovations

Kentucky basketball Coach John Calipari takes fans on a tour of the renovations being done to the men’s locker room and lounge at the Joe Craft Center in a video posted Friday on CoachCal.com.

“It’s about these kids,” said Calipari, who looks a little disheveled having just come from a practice. “How do we make it the best setup for kids to reach their dreams. That’s what we try to do here.”

The work, part of a $4 million renovation paid for by private donors, including a $1.5 million gift from UK alumnus Davis Marksbury, looks to be in its middle phase with much of the restructuring done, but most of the finishing work remaining.

When completed, the “Marksbury Players First Suite” will include a spacious player lounge that opens to a video room where the team will meet before every practice.

The new locker room will be in the round, much like the one they also have in Rupp Arena.

“I want this locker room 10 years from now to be relevant,” said Calipari. “Whatever we put in it, we’re thinking futuristic.”

Further into the renovations reveal a massage area, a large hot and cold tub, four 7-foot individual shower stalls and a steam shower the coach admits is really for him.

“I need to be in the steam shower to let off steam,” he explains. “Instead of going nutty because as you get old, you get cranky. You get old and cranky, and I don’t want to be that old, cranky guy. So, I need to be in the steam shower. I have one in my office and one here. I take two. I take one there and then I come down and take another steam shower to try to be like a normal human being.”

Calipari said he would post another video later as the work progresses. As he talked during Friday’s video, renderings of what the space would look like were interwoven into the shots of its current state.

This story was originally published November 17, 2017 at 1:55 PM with the headline "Calipari leads video tour of UK locker room renovations."