Ex-Cat explains how he got big man Kentucky wanted: ‘Fit matters’
Coming off beating his alma mater in a competition for highly coveted graduate transfer Matt Haarms, Brigham Young coach — and former Kentucky player — Mark Pope was in a position to credibly explain the key to recruiting.
“The goal in recruiting is to find the right fit,” Pope said Friday, the day after Haarms committed to BYU. “It’s not to go to some predetermined guy. If you find the right fit, you’re going to be way more successful than you are if you just see some guy with size or length or there’s a certain number of stars. Fit matters.”
The idea of Haarms being a better fit for BYU than Kentucky might seem illogical. Pope acknowledged that it might seem “counterintuitive.”
With Nick Richards and EJ Montgomery entering this year’s NBA Draft, Kentucky has a big need for a “big.” Graduate transfer Nate Sestina exhausted his eligibility in 2019-20, leaving 6-foot-7 Keion Brooks as the lone returning player on the front line.
By contrast, BYU has two 6-9 players returning in Gavin Baxter and Kolby Lee, plus two “bigs’ who sat out last season as transfers: 6-11 Richard Harward and 6-10 Wyatt Lowell.
“One thing we talked to Matt about is the opportunity to play both the ‘five’ and the ‘four,’” Pope said. “So, Matt doesn’t have to take the beating for 40 minutes from the other team’s ‘five.’ …
“It also allows him some more freedom to show and grow his game, which I think he’s incredibly capable of doing.”
Pope made sure to say he did not mean to identify or question how the other two finalists in the recruiting competition — Kentucky and Texas Tech — intended to use Haarms. He only meant to explain BYU’s vision of the 7-foot-3 transfer from Purdue.
When asked if preparing a player for the NBA was part of Brigham Young’s recruiting pitch, Pope said that developing players was a key. He pointed out that he could not say he had coached a team in the NCAA Tournament.
“When we recruit, we go to that immediately,” he said of player development.
In Haase’s case, Pope said he and his staff dove deep into analytics.
“It was an approach to his game that he was unfamiliar with,” Pope said. “He learned things about his game in that first and second conversation that he didn’t know. I think it’s really exhilarating.”
Rather than take bows for successfully wooing a player that Kentucky reportedly wanted, Pope spoke of the significance of merely being in the same recruiting conversation as UK.
“It means you’re probably hanging out in the right part of the (transfer) portal …,” he said. “I hope that we get to spend a lot of time recruiting against Kentucky and Kansas and North Carolina and Texas Tech and all the great programs because that’s where you should live if you’re a legitimate program.”
Pope, whose three seasons for UK included being co-captain of the 1996 national championship team, said that he was unaware of any negative reaction from the Big Blue Nation as a result of Haarms’ decision. He scoffed at any notion that Kentucky will not continue being a superior program. That echoed UK Coach John Calipari’s assurances earlier this spring that Kentucky will continue to be Kentucky even with five players entering this year’s NBA Draft.
“C’mon,” Pope said. “And I’m saying this in a positive way. Nobody’s worried about Kentucky being a great team. They’re going to be a great team.”
Pope made BYU’s recruitment of Haarms sound like a two-week whirlwind. The first thrill was Haarms agreeing for a call on Zoom. “I couldn’t believe it,” Pope said. “I was excited. After the call, Matt said something like, ‘There’s nobody more surprised than me. But I actually think I might talk to you guys again.’”
With Haarms aboard, Pope saw the transfer impacting the BYU team in multiple ways:
▪ As a shot-blocker. Haarms ranked among the Big Ten’s top five in blocks in each of his three seasons for Purdue. Pope said that Purdue opponents shot 10 percent better around the basket when Haarms was not on the floor.
▪ As a shooter. His 30-plus percent accuracy from three-point range can make a “significant jump,” Pope said.
▪ As Mr. Hustle. “The thing I’m most excited about, if you’ve seen him play, is he plays with such unbridled passion on the court that it overflows all over everybody,” Pope said.
