It keeps looking more and more like the Tar Heels will not be in the immediate future for Kentucky as a regular season opponent. I am not a fan of this, especially after this past Saturday’s epic showdown that still has the sports world buzzing. After all, the game was talked about on all of the major radio talk shows and all of the sports television shows such as Around the Horn and Pardon the Interruption.
So why would Cal deprive the fan base, the sports hosts and writers, and college basketball fans around America of this game? Well, I listened to his radio show tonight and he had a couple of different reasons. But his main reason, as always, is he keeps his players first.
Here is a quick hit synopsis of what Cal said and my thoughts:
Kentucky is the Best Program in the Country
To Kentucky fans, this statement is a no brainer. Of course we think we have the best team in the country, but what does that have to do with playing North Carolina? Calipari’s response to that was simple; Kentucky doesn’t need an early season marquee game like North Carolina to build its resume. Kentucky is a team that other team’s use to build their resume’s, not vice-versa.
He Schedules to his team’s strengths
His most interesting remarks on the whole subject came when he started talking about “Players First”.
He gave this scenario: what if UK loses all of their big guns to the draft and next year’s recruits come in and they aren’t as good. In fact, they are far from being ready to face a veteran and tough squad like North Carolina at this time of the season. What if instead of winning the game, the team gets totally blasted and it crushes every bit of confidence they had and it ends up ruining the season. It could be demoralizing and the season might be lost.
He went on and on to speak about how he will always put his team first and didn’t play games in the early season in order to impress people, but in order to help his team grow and learn together as a unit. He again reiterated that we are Kentucky and we don’t need to schedule to tough to be great.
All of this was a little dramatic for my taste.
Conference Play is Tough Enough
His next line of arguments were centered around the toughness of the SEC. This is where he kind of lost me, because besides Florida, Alabama and maybe Mississippi State, the SEC has been terrible this year and has been for quite some time.
In my view, a young UK team will need some tough early tests at home, on the road and on a neutral floor because they might not get enough of it in conference play. Last year’s team was upset a few times by some teams that had no business beating them, but you can’t tell me that the victory over Louisville and a close game with UNC did not help their confidence and help them look past their conference clunkers.
Thoughts of a Fan
I honestly don’t know why John Calipari is all of a sudden so adamant about getting IU, Louisville or North Carolina off of the schedule. Ever since he tweeted out his poll on this subject, this story is dying a hard death.
I like watching games like the one on Saturday; in fact I love them. They are exciting and they are something that all Kentucky fans look forward to early in the year. Playing teams like North Carolina, Kansas, Duke and Michigan State gives us a chance to compete at the highest level against the most historic names in the sports. Names that we belong with in the grand scheme of things.
Taking away North Carolina would be depriving the fans of something great. This is one area that I do not see eye to eye with Calipari. I understand that the program is about the players and for the players, but I hope he doesn’t forget the fans. He has brought great teams back to Kentucky and has put us back in the limelight of college basketball and we will always be grateful for that.
But don’t take away the North Carolina game. It’s one of the best events of the year.