Mark Pope just said the quiet part out loud, and it probably made the hair stand up on the back of your neck if you followed Kentucky basketball in the 90's.
When asked how he can help his team get out in transition, where they are at their best, Pope admitted that the answer might be looking back to Kentucky's most legendary weapon: The Press.
"It helps us with stops. It helps us when we get the ball out quickly on a make... It helps us by being as fresh as we can on the court. We're not quite that team where we can just be an unrelenting force in transition. So, we kind of got to break the game a little bit to get there."
Kentucky looks to keep channeling the 'Mardi Gras Miracle'
For any fan who lived through the 90s, the phrase "break the game" brings back one specific memory: The Mardi Gras Miracle.
In 1994, Rick Pitino’s squad was dead in the water, down 31 points to LSU in the second half. They didn't win that game with half-court sets. They won it by unleashing a chaotic, unrelenting press that shattered LSU’s will. Kentucky would run until the opposing team just couldn't run anymore, then the Cats would speed it up even more.
That Kentucky team clawed back to win without even needing overtime. And here is the crazy stat that links then to now: In that miracle game, Kentucky had 7 steals.
Against Tennessee last week? Kentucky had 8.
Mark Pope knows this team struggles in the half-court. They can get stagnant. They can get stiff. The cuts don't always look crisp. But a thunder dunk off a steal, that can wake the crowd and the entire team up.
When you pressure the opposing team into turning it over, you don't just get the ball back; you get it back in chaos. You get easy layups. You get open transition threes. But you also let the other team know that nothing will be easy. They are going to have to dig deep on every possession because nothing, not even inbounding the ball, is going to be easy tonight.
"It helps us when we can manufacture something on the defensive end to get a deflection or a steal."
Pope is realizing what Pitino knew decades ago: Sometimes, if you can't beat them playing their game, you have to break the game until it becomes yours.