Mark Pope discusses his approach this summer ahead of debut season at Kentucky

At Kentucky, you don't rebuild. Instead, Mark Pope is looking to 'reload' in year one.

It's been well-documented the 'reload' he's had in his three months on the job, taking a roster that had zero players when he signed on, to a 12-man roster that began summer workouts this week.

It's been full-steam ahead for Pope who is looking to expedite things this summer. While he's using some of the same mindset he had at BYU when he made the change from the WCC to the Big 12 a season ago, he understands things are a bit different this season with Kentucky.

Pope described the transition to the Big 12 at BYU as 'a two, to three, to four-year project' so he wanted to bring in a lot of younger players the first year to be able to grow the foundation moving forward. He knows that won't and can't work at Kentucky this season.

"At Kentucky, we're turning this into a one-year project for the most part," Pope told Fox Sports' John Fanta. "But Year 1 is going to be what we do for the next eight weeks during the summer here, and we're going hard. We're going all-in. There's no pacing ourselves during this time ... We're going to try to make these eight weeks our Year 1."

It's no surprise Pope is going to try to expedide things.

He went with veteran players who can process things at a quicker pace because they've been in the environment before. That includes six players who have played at least four years in college, some with five years.

Even some of the younger players he picked up through the transfer portal played major roles in their early seasons.

"Now, the reason why I think we can do it is because we got to hand-select these guys and we're talking about a lot of fifth-year guys, and veteran guys. Even Brandon Garrison, who is younger, is a sophomore who started a year in the Big 12," Pope said. "So, we think that these guys' growth curve is going to be way faster.

"They were hand-picked because they already did a lot of the things we are going to be asking them to do. And so we're trying to get Year 1 done this summer and get right into Year 2, if you will, when the fall hits – to see if we can make a massive splash in our first season here at Kentucky."

Kentucky hasn't made it out of the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament since 2019, losing in the first round in two of the last three seasons.

But, the lack of success hasn't stopped Mark Pope and the rest of this Kentucky roster from 'understanding the assignment'. It's simple, yet difficult -- 'hang banner 9'.

Pope has expectations to bring a National Championship back to Lexington and it starts this summer with a critical two months of prep.