PRE-BLUEGRASS SHOWCASE
NOV. 23, 2020
HEAD COACH JOHN CALIPARI
On playing this week with everything that’s gone on in the pandemic and the status of Keion Brooks Jr. …
“Keion first. I do not believe he’ll be here the first week [leg injury]. It’s day-to-day kind of stuff, but he hasn’t done live stuff yet. So, we’ve gotta get him doing live stuff even though he’sconditioning and all the other stuff. Until he’s in there, I don’t feel comfortable. Second thing is, you know, this thing is, we don’t control it, it controls us, the virus. So, I just heard Mississippi is out now until December 7th. What I’m doing is everything I can to mitigate here. You guys know – anybody that knows us – knows this situation. We’re in the lodge. Nobody else is in there. They got their own bedroom and bathroom. The chef cooks their meal there. He’s there. He gets tested. They walk across the parking lot to our practice facility. No one is in the offices, so there’s no, like, it can go through the system. There’s no one in here. And so, you have us and the women on different sides. We come in different doors. We don’t see each other. The problem is when we start playing. The good news is, they’re saying of all the sports, they don’t believe anyone has caught it from the playing field or the court. They think it’s meal rooms, hotels, planes, buses. It’s contact with others outside of that area, and we’ve done a pretty good job. So, all I can tell you is, even though we think we’re doing good—we’re wearing those (Kinexon) chips to every practice, every scrimmage. We’re having the officials wear them. The managers, the coaches (are wearing them) to mitigate all this. I just want to make sure our kids are safe. We’re talking with right now – and I’ve never done this before – we may travel on game day. Like, game day. You would say, ‘Why would you travel on the day of a game? Wouldn’t you be better being rested?’ Yeah, but it’sanother hotel stay. We’re going to have our personal bus bussed to wherever we’re playing that when we get off that plane, we’re on a bus that is sanitized with a bus driver we know. And then go to the gym if we have time to shoot around. If we don’t, we don’t. We go to the hotel, lay around for an hour or two, have a pregame meal, play the game, immediately get on our own bus, on that plane that didn’t leave – it’s that same plane we came in on – we get on it, we go. We may have face shields and masks. I may be overdoing it, but I’d rather be safe than sorry.”
On if all three opposing teams in the Bluegrass Showcase are good to go …
“Yeah, I called Brad (Calipari) last night and asked when (Detroit Mercy is getting in). They’ve been good and they had another test yesterday. They’ll get it back today in Detroit. I’mhearing Morehead has been good and Richmond. So, it appears as though we’re good to go – but that’s today.”
On his thoughts on moving the tournament to one location and if they might do S-curve seeding for the tournament …
“I’ve gotta give it to Mitch (Barnhart) and that (selection) committee. Bubbling it up is the safest way for these kids to play basketball. Having six courts in Indianapolis where they can play, and kind of like the old NAIA, if you remember, where there would be 32 teams come in, and when you lose, you’re immediately out. You’re on the bus and you go home. Just play it down. They told me the reason the NBA bubble basketball was so good is because the teams didn’t have to travel and they got in a rhythm of playing. So, the rhythm they didn’t want was three or four days off and have to play. They wanted to play every other day. Well, you know what, we can kind of do the same thing. And it hurt us in Lexington because we had the first and second rounds, but this wasn’t about Lexington. This wasn’tabout Kentucky. This was about, we’re in an environment that we feel is the best way, and I agree with them. I think what they did and the stance they took, I think, was a good one.”
On his comfort level with fans being in the building this week and the impact fewer fans will have on his team …
“Here’s what I would say: The team that gets hurt the most – and forget about financial – by not having fans or only having 15% or whatever is Kentucky. And the reason it is, people coming into this building are always playing in front of 20-something thousand. And it’s a big advantage for us. Our fans and our building play a big part in our success. I don’t know what our record is during my 11 years here, but I think it’s pretty high in this building. Well, if it’s just a building and a court, we don’t have the advantage we usually have, so it’s going to hurt us more than anybody else. My hope is we figure out a way that fans that want to come to the game can be tested so that we feel comfortable being in our building – not just with the thermometer and saying, OK, they don’t have a fever. Because there are asymptomatic people. But there is a test given a couple of days before. Now, a test isn’t the vaccine, but people will feel more comfortable having a mask on and having social distance. Maybe we can get more in our building if we figure out a way to try to test so that everybody is comfortable. And maybe we show the rest of the country this is, like, the only way you can increase the number of fans there. But I think we’re a waysaway. We’re just going to try to get through these first three games in five days, which is going to be hard for my team. Just so you know, we scrimmaged yesterday and I came home smiling. I told my wife. She said, ‘Wow, was it good?’ I said, ‘It was our worst scrimmage since I’ve been the coach here.’ I’vegot both feet and hands on the panic button right now. I’m just hoping that they needed to play against somebody else and they just got tired of each other. Because if not, I’m going to have to be the most patient soul on the earth when we start the season like 0-6. ‘Just be patient.’ That’s what you should say to me: be patient. Because I like the team. Not playing hard enough. Not enough team defense. Everyone is still locked into their own thing. ‘I need my stuff,’ instead of making easy plays. ‘I’ve gottamake a play.’ And so, it leads to turnovers or putting guys in bad positions. We have a ways to go. And again, we’ve got 10 new guys. ‘You do it every year.’ We have 10 new players. So, we’renot very good right now, but I think in time we should be OK.”
On a young team not having a Blue-White Game or exhibitions and how helpful those games are usually to get a team prepared in a normal season …
“I’m not worried about giving people a feel. I’m worried about giving me a feel. Like, what is this team? And so, no exhibition. We’ve scrimmaged in the past (Blue-White). We’ve had none of that. They’ve only played against themselves. They’re tired. They’re playing our plays, if you know what I’m saying. They know what the plays are. They’re playing against each other. And so, it’s hard to make a pass. And again, guys, as you’re doing this, you and I know there are certain games, certain guys that will stand up and other guys will stand up, and by the end of the year, we’ll have seven guys that have scored 25 or 30 in a game. But, you’re not doing it every game. We’re still—we’re not trusting everything. We’re not trusting each other. We’re not trusting how we’re playing. You would say, ‘Well, why wouldn’t they? Haven’t they seen the history of what’s happened for the kids?’ Yes, but, ‘I want to do this.’ So, they’re fighting it a little bit. We’ve got good kids. We’re asking guys to do stuff they’ve never done before, which means they’re going to be a little uncomfortable. Asking them to create habits they’ve never had before, which means they’re a little bit uncomfortable. We have shot blockers; we just don’t block any shots. I don’t understand it, but we don’t. We have length but we’re not really good defensively right now, and I think a lot of it is team defense.”
On playing Richmond, an experienced team that thrives on playing against indecisive teams, on Sunday …
“We haven’t because we have Morehead (first). They haven’theard me talking about Richmond. There are things we’re doing in practice to try to prepare them, so the day between the Richmond game we’ll say, ‘Remember all that stuff we were doing? Here’s why we were doing it.’ Their experience, their ability to control the game, to make you play through every possession. If you play 15 seconds, you’re getting beat. You’vegot to play the whole possession. On offense, because of how they play, you cannot take high-risk plays. You’ve gotta be efficient offensively. Attack and run and get in the lane. But not make a 50-50 play. It’s gotta be a 70-30 or 80-20 or don’t make it. If you’re going to take a bad shot against them, you take it late in the clock. Me saying all that to you, we have no chance of being like that. Just so you know. It’s the third game of the year, 10 new players. They’ve never played against a college team let alone a team that runs, quote, Princeton kind of stuff. I’ve got two feet and two hands on the panic button. If I was worried about Richmond right now, I would have my head pushing it down, too.”
On if there is any one aspect of a game that would keep him up before an opener and in what ways that’s magnified during this unique time …
“The mistake I may have made with this group, I should have worried more about fight and playing the whole possession. Done less – maybe not had enough to really win a game – like, less offense, less out of bounds, less situational work and more throw it up, let’s go. Fight. Every drill, fight. Body to body. But you worry (about) injury. You worry about, you’ve gotta play games. You worry (about) our schedule, which is way, way too top heavy – way, way too top heavy for this group. So, you try to balance it, but I think I went a little bit too much (of), let’s be prepared to look like a basketball team. One of the teams I coached here, my first year, was the worst execution team I had, but they would fight and we won a lot of games. We knew, that team, we could win a national championship unless shooting did us (in). In the Elite Eight we shoot 0 for 22 from the 3 or whatever it was. But we knew that’s the one thing that could get us and it hit us that time. But this team, if we’re not fighting, if we’re not playing full possessions, if we’re playing tired – like, ‘I played every minute in high school’ – you can’t. You’ve gottakeep it on. It’s all stuff that I think we’re going to have to learn as we go.”
On playing against his son, Brad, on Friday …
“I’ve already told our team, ‘If anybody blocks his shot, you’re out.’ And I told him we’re going to play a box-and-one. ‘So, you’re not getting any balls, just so you know.’ But, I’m so proud of him. I’ll tell you what, what he’s done discipline wise. His diet. What he’s done training. He went up to South Dakota and trained on his own. Like, he said, ‘This is what I want to do.’ And he stayed in the hotel and washed his own sheets. He loves his team. He loves Mike (Davis). He said their team is better. He won’t give me any hints on how they’re going to play or anything like that. I said, ‘Well, how do you think you’re going to play?’ He said, ‘Dad, do you think I’m going to tell you? We’re trying to beat you.’ I want him to play well and we want to beat Detroit. The only problem is Mike’s kid could go for 50, and so you better have someone to guard him and you better understand he’ll ball fake you, he’ll get you to foul. That’show he plays. And he could get 50 on my team. I don’t have an Ashton Hagans that I can say, ‘We got this. We’re OK.’ We don’t have that guy. He’s playing for the Minnesota Timberwolves.”
On if this feels like uncharted territory with 10 new players even with his normal roster turnover …
“Yeah. It was a different kind of team. Maybe a more physical team. This team isn’t really physical. The team I had in ’14 (2013-14 season), we started five freshmen. The two guards (the Harrison twins) were physical. Julius (Randle) was physical.Even James Young was physical. And I think, was Dakari (Johnson) on that team? I think he was. He was physical. So, this team doesn’t have that physique. If you remember that team, we didn’t figure it out until March and then we tweaked some stuff and it totally changed who we were. But early on, I mean, we played Michigan State and we were down 20. It was like we were getting smoked. Not quite as bad as when we had Tyler Herro and that crew when they had us down 40. This is a different one. Trying to get them on the same page. I think what’s going to happen is, they’ve gotta get smacked a little bit to where they’re looking at me like, ‘Coach, tell us how we gottado this because we’re not liking this.’ I think the biggest thing this group—I just met with two of the guys, which is why I was a little late. They gotta understand we’re all tied together. Your jobs are to pick each other up. Your jobs are to make it easier for each other. If you’re out here doing your own thing and these two guys struggle, you two, all the stuff you think is going to happen ain’t happening. Believe me, I’ve done this 35 years. I know I look 40 but I’ve done it a long, long time. And so now, you’ve gotta be those guys. Can’t have body language. Can’thave meltdowns. You’ve gotta be with these guys and really locked in. Yesterday showed us that we have that in us. Oh my gosh. Let’s hope we got it out yesterday, because if that becomes who we are, whew, going to be rough.”