BREAKING News: Kentucky's John Calipari Is A Good Coach

There are people that, no matter what the objective evidence says, will always believe the opposite. Some people believe that 9/11 was inside job. Some people believe that climate change isn’t real. Some people believe that the U.S. never made it to the moon. And there’s probably people that still believe the world is flat. Another group to add to that fringe are the people that insist that University of Kentucky head men’s basketball coach John Calipari cannot coach.

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Look, it’s obvious that Coach Calipari is a polarizing figure. He’s the only coach in NCAA history to have two Final Four appearances vacated. I get that. However, when you look at his on the court results, it’s folly to continue to argue that he’s a solely a great recruiter. His current run in Lexington (4 Final Fours in the last 6 seasons), puts him on a short list with UCLA legend John Wooden and Duke’s Coach K. And any time you join that company, you have to be pretty good at your job.

A lot of Calipari’s detractors point to his 2013 season at Kentucky as the biggest indicator that he can’t coach. John Calipari followed up a national title with a first round NIT loss to Robert Morris. Obviously, that wasn’t the season that anyone wanted, but when you factor in that he lost his best player, Nerlens Noel, in February the NIT appearance becomes a bit more understandable. And nevermind the NIT appearance was sandwiched by two Final Fours on either side. Obviously, he can’t coach, they say.

There’s a thought that with all the talent that Coach Cal has had come through Lexington that the trophy case should have more hardware in it. I know the Big Blue Nation certainly wishes that were the case, but does that mean he’s not a good coach? In six seasons, he’s had Final Four or better finishes winning one title. 25% of his Final Four trips have ended with a title. When you look at other quality coaches, he’s not the worst in this regard:

John Wooden, 12 FFs, 10 titles: 83%
Mike Krzyzewski, 12 FFs, 5 titles: 41%
Dean Smith, 11 FFs, 2 titles: 18%
Rick Pitino, 7 FFs, 2 titles: 28.5%
Roy Williams, 7 FFs, 2 titles: 28.5%
Tom Izzo, 7 FFs, 1 title: 14%

Another knock on John Calipari is that he’s had a tremendous amount of talent come to Lexington, so of course he should win. Well, John Wooden had the luck/fortune of having Lew Alcindor (Kareem Abdul-Jabbar) and Bill Walton, two of the all-time college basketball greats succeed each other at UCLA. Dean Smith had James Worthy, Sam Perkins and a guy named Michael Jordan pass through Chapel Hill. Coach K has had his share of great college players (Grant Hill and Christian Laettner come to mind). And even though Pitino and Izzo might not have had the big names or highly recruited players suit up for them, let’s not pretend that they’ve taken talent-less groups to the promised land either.

If the anti-Calipari folks would just say they don’t like him and think he’s dirty and just leave it at that, it would be fine. Yet, this notion persists that all he does is roll out the balls and the players just play. What we’re seeing this season with Duke is just how hard it is to rebuild your roster after a mass exodus of one and done players to the NBA. It’s not as easy as people like to believe.

Dislike or even hate John Calipari all you want, but numbers are numbers. Since he’s arrived in Lexington, Coach Cal is 203-42 (82.9%) overall and 85-22 (79.4%) in the SEC. And even though this year’s team is sitting at 13-4, would anyone really be surprised if Cal “tweaked” this team and got them to yet another Final Four? I wouldn’t and that’s because John Calipari is a very good basketball coach.

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BREAKING Kentucky Wildcats News: John Calipari Is A Good Coach

By Terry Brown | Jan 20, 2016