‘We are deadly serious about winning.’ Everything Mark Pope said after UK won its exhibition.

Everything University of Kentucky head coach Mark Pope said during his press conference following Wednesday night’s 123-52 exhibition basketball win over Kentucky Wesleyan at Rupp Arena Lexington:

Pope’s opening statement: Yeah. I’m really grateful for Kentucky Wesleyan. I love opportunities to play championship teams. This is a veteran championship team that’s going to have another great year. What Drew’s done at Wesleyan is incredible. It’s such a storied program. They essentially have the majority of the roster back. Missing one legitimate big, big piece. They played the right way and they are going to have a ton of success. So, I’m super grateful to them. It was a good night for us. I’m really proud of our guys. The way they — their focus was tremendous. Their decision-making, for the most part was really good. They are very much on their toes and in attack mode and that’s where we like to be.

Mark, first game, 12 new players, but it looked pretty cohesive no matter what lineup combination you had. Did that surprise you?

I was pleased as much as I was surprised. I was just pleased. I thought our focus on playing off two feet. Wesleyan is a good defensive team and what they do is they really crowd and really gap heavy and punish you raking gaps and I thought our guys from the very beginning did a tremendous job about making plays for a teammate and playing off two feet, winning the gap, being really judicious, and really sharing the ball the way that we hope to and anticipate that we will.

The best part of it was it’s the first night, the first time these guys have ever been into a game together, the first time in this building in a game in official uniforms in front of our fans. There’s all the distractions that come with it. So much new today as we went through our first game day. There were a couple of funny moments in shoot-around where I was just moving on to the next thing and I realize that nobody on the team knows what the next thing is because we’ve not got anybody that’s done it besides Jaxson (Robinson). These guys did a great job taking on all the new and really executing it.

That’s our standard. That’s what we expect from our guys and I was proud of that. I was pleased with it more than surprised.

Mark, you said last week at SEC media days that you wanted to see your team get exposed going up against someone new. I don’t know how much you can nitpick over a 71-point win but did you see any cracks that you were looking for or anything like that?

Yeah, there’s ways we can improve and we are going to continue to improve on our communication. I felt like we were dialed in most of the game. We had a couple of little spaces where we kind of lost ourselves and we were exposed on the glass a little bit with a team that really shoots a lot of balls and they end up being long rebounds and so we were exposed there a little bit where we can individually and collectively, where we can see that on film. See us doing it, where we erred in our instinct to go get a hit and then where we were really successful. I think we can learn and grow from that. I think we can also learn from things we did well. You know, we will take every experience and learn everything we can. But there are certainly things we can quote from this. What we learned.

We really do believe that seeing yourselves or somebody execute it right is actually a better teacher than seeing us do it wrong. So we are pretty judicious about how we do that and so there are some good, right stuff that we show tonight also.

Mark, Otega (Oweh) came out very aggressive in the early going and was efficient offensively throughout the game. Just what have you seen from him over the course of the summer until now and how can he open up the offense when he plays like that?

I was so proud of Otega tonight. You know, I actually wondered if this was going to be a little bit of a complicated game for him. Because it is such a heavy gap team. His decision-making about when he attacked all the way to the rim and when he came to two feet was brilliant and actually incredible all night long. And first time here, first time playing this way, first time playing with these guys. For his decision-making to be so good, I was really, really proud of him. Listen, he is a big body. He’s got big, broad shoulders and he is really powerful at the rim. He carves out space and he actually puts a shoulder in your chest when he turns your hips and creates some space for him to go finish and he is really explosive downhill but he’s always been that but what’s been really brilliant to watch is his decision-making about when he chooses to get there and when he chooses to be a two-foot guy and a two-handed guy and he was great tonight.

How much did this night mean to you? Back to the pregame introduction, normally the crowd roars the loudest for whoever is their favorite. Eventually maybe later in the season that will be one of the players. Yours was the loudest. How much did tonight mean to you?

Well, I think this is special for all of us. This is really never going to be about me. I’m the most blessed person in the world that I get to be back here as part of BBN and I’m blessed I get to coach this group of guys. We still have so much growing to do. The fact we get to be in this building with these great fans and wearing this incredibly tradition-filled flagship jersey is just super humbling. I think all of those things are really meaningful to me. It’s incredibly important.

Kentucky shot 42 3s tonight. Do you think you can keep up that pace in future games?

Well, I hope so. It’s hard to get 42 up. It’s really hard to do that. Our goal is to be over 30 and that can get really complicated to get to 30. I thought we turned a couple down tonight that I wish we would have taken. I like the fact, what I like is most of the shots were earned. There wasn’t a lot of belligerent shooting. There was a lot of shots that were earned. We earned them a bunch of different ways and we earned them by racing the space and by screening and earning by finishing cuts. We earn them by feeling pressure, hitting corner. We earn them by sprinting to the deep corner and making sure our spacing is right and I thought our did guys did a terrific job earning those shots although there are several that we left on the table and four or five places where we had good penetration either by the pass or off the bounce. And we didn’t fill the corner behind it.

We will continue to get better and better at that and what happens is as we get better and better filling the corner it stretches defense and we get a lot of burn cuts and a lot of 45-degree passes. You turn down the hammer and actually choose the 45-degree and it gets really complicated that first pass rotation guy. We still have a lot of space to grow there.

Mark, kind of a two-part question. First, when you were dreaming about this game and thinking about it. Was this exactly how you would have hoped it would go in terms of eight players in double figures and 60 percent from the field, 50 percent from three? And also, maybe the anxiousness of like, hey — you want to win big, because you don’t want the fan base’s first experience to see we squeaked by and barely won a game kind of thing?

We are deadly serious about winning. Winning matters. I don’t spend a lot of time — I don’t spend as much time — I know this sounds very contradictory. I don’t know exactly how to explain it. We are here to win. This is Kentucky. The first time we don’t win a game you guys are all going to go burn my house down. OK?

We don’t spend a lot of time thinking about what this sheet is going to look like after the game. We spend all of our time thinking about what we are trying to do in the moment. Right? And so, I think of course there is all the nerves. It’s the first time in this building. This is Kentucky and there is massive expectations and all of those things. You know, I’m really consumed with seeing how fast we can get better. The way we get better by just being dialed in on exactly what we are doing. I wasn’t anticipating seeing anything on the stat sheet.

I was just curious on how well do we coach our guys being great decision-makers and all the ways we do it and how well we can get our guys — I was really concerned about our energy. This is the first time. We try to keep it at 4 or 5 very focused but in terms of emotional energy we try to live at like a 3, 4, and 5. And then we are trying to get to a 9 or 9.5 during games where we can still function making decisions.

This is a long, drawn-out conversation we don’t have time for. But I was thinking more about our energy. I took at the shot at the guys before the game in the locker room and I was really trying to spend all of my energy trying to gauge our energy and the guys were probably better than I was in terms of the energy that they came out with to be able to have great intensive energy but still be a decision-maker and executing.

We are spending a lot more time thinking about those things. Then this just happens because of what we are focusing on.

What did you think about the way Trent Noah and Travis Perry played and what do you think about having them on the floor at the same time?

Trent is not shy. It’s really great to have him on the floor. Our guys love him. Everybody on the bench was losing their mind. Kerr (Kriisa), I thought Kerr was going to, I don’t know. I thought he was going to start ripping his clothes off. He was so excited. Listen, they are a really important part of our team. We are really blessed that we can have three freshmen that could play every minute of the game. I think Travis Perry has been really extraordinary and it’s hard to be a point guard for me.

Like it’s really hard to be a point guard for me. I don’t know if that’s exactly his natural position but he has come in here and if you think about it, his first time in the gym as a team we — what are we at? 32 (assists) and five (turnovers). That’s with TP playing, TP is playing 15 minutes at the point guard spot. That’s really impressive. Right? And so, I’m super proud of both those guys.

Collin Chandler was excellent tonight. He took a step forward and he’s going to be a special player and those three freshmen are going to have a big impact on us this year and next year and it makes you feel good to have those three guys here and know that they are going to continue with this program.

Lamont Butler was all over the stat sheet tonight. What are the expectations for him from this game going forward?

I expect him to have six steals every single night. I’ve never seen guys — I’m older than everybody in this room, I think. I heard one laugh. Someone laughed. Where is the old guy in here? Mitch is over here, hey now. But I’ve never seen this number. Lamont Butler had more steals than our whole team had turnovers tonight. I’ve never seen that, actually. That’s really incredible. He is a special player. I’ve never coached a guy like him on the defensive at the point of attack.

Listen, I’m telling you, this Kennedy Miles is a terrific basketball player. Kennedy Miles is a terrific basketball player. He’s a championship team leading point guard. He’s a terrific basketball player. He didn’t have his best night tonight but Lamont Butler had a lot to do with that and it gets hard. At some point during the game, it was the right decision. (Kentucky Wesleyan coach) Drew (Cooper) chose to work a lot of 4-5 ball screens because you had this Deion Sanders corner, like we are not throwing that side of the field anymore. Forget it, we are just not going over there. That’s the type of impact that Lamont could have. He is incredibly special and I think you have heard me say 100 times. I think he is the best defensive perimeter player in college basketball and certainly the best defensive point guard and also a great leader. I thought he was terrific tonight and I thought he got our guys started well. One of the great things about Lamont is playing at San Diego State. We had to play them every year and the show, if you have not heard of it, San Diego State is pretty insane and so this environment is super familiar to him. He has played in the Final Four and national championship games and he’s pretty unfazed.

I’m telling you. It is a gift to have a player like that you can lean on as a coach. He is really special.

Mark, off-topic just a bit. When Lee Anne is not in the backyard killing moles. You talk about, you and her, this is a partnership. What does that mean to you? That you are a partnership in all of this?

It means Lee Anne tells me what to do and I do it really — come on, man. I’m not shy about it. Lee Anne is the best part of me. I’m super blessed. You know, she’s my best friend. I’m madly in love with her. I still can’t believe that she takes the time to talk to me from time to time.

It just doesn’t make sense to me. I’m super blessed. I’m really blessed. It’s just incredible. And she does tell me what to do. And I do it. It’s awesome. OK. Thank you, guys. Appreciate you all. You have a great night.