Barnhart: Donors have already pledged $4 million to UK basketball NIL after Mark Pope hire
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Kentucky makes its choice
Click below to read more coverage from the Lexington Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com about the impending hire of former UK player Mark Pope as the new Kentucky men’s basketball coach.
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New Kentucky basketball coach Mark Pope will have some help rebuilding the Wildcats’ roster after John Calipari’s move to Arkansas.
With most, if not all, of the current players and commitments expected to leave, Pope will need to hit the ground running recruiting transfers and high school players for the 2024-25 season. To help him in that goal, a group of donors has already pledged $4 million in name, image and likeness funds, UK athletics director Mitch Barnhart confirmed Friday in an appearance on Kentucky Sports Radio.
“The brand is real, and it is really, really important,” Barnhart said. “We’ve got to effectively use it.”
While one of the most common complaints about Pope’s hire on social media has been about his lack of track record as a recruiter of high-level talent, Barnhart said Pope already has heard from two recruits who would not listen to his pitch to play at BYU who have said they would play for him at Kentucky since news broke of his hiring.
Barnhart said he expected Pope’s infectious personality combined with the history of UK basketball to help attract top talent to the program, but he acknowledged “proof is in the pudding, obviously, and we’ve got to go get that done.”
As for fans who might be skeptical of the hire after Kentucky was turned down by top targets Scott Drew and Dan Hurley, Barnhart pointed to Pope’s love for the program after captaining the 1996 team to a national championship as reason for optimism.
“This is our time to not bicker,” Barnhart said in an apparent allusion to the unhappiness in the fan base since a first-round NCAA Tournament loss to No. 14 seed Oakland in March. “We’ve been bickering awhile about what we should do, not do. It’s time to say this is our guy. He’s one of ours. It is time to roll in, get behind this guy and let’s go win something together and let’s make sure we have the heartbeat of what’s on the front of that jersey the right way.
“This guy can do it. He’s got an unbelievable passion for this program. He’s got an intelligence about the game, and he is absolutely one of the most positive people I’ve ever been around. The (former) players, they’re going to be at that presser. They have come out, they believe in him. I don’t ever want to … say ours aren’t good enough to go lead our program. They are, and this guy is great is great enough to lead our program. He is. We can go win championships and we will.”
This story was originally published April 12, 2024 at 12:09 PM.
