By: Keith Kappes
Columnist
Carter County Times
The new tee shirt’s message was hurtful but truthful. And it accurately conveyed the bitter disappointment of many basketball fans in Big Blue Nation.
Yes, the long-awaited, comeback season of those beloved Kentucky Wildcats came crashing down in the first round of the NCAA Tournament in an overtime loss to the Peacocks of Saint Peter’s University of Jersey City, N.J.
Can you imagine a wildcat being taken down by a big, colorful bird?
Within a few hours of the game’s sorrowful outcome, social media exploded with harsh criticism of Head Coach John Calipari. Some of his players also were dinged.
By the next morning, the Internet in my part of Kentucky was showing a doctored photograph of an adult peacock chasing a frightened little boy down a sidewalk, except that the face of the little boy had been replaced by the face of Coach Calipari.
To pour salt into the open wound, the next day announcement of Kenny Payne’s hiring as head coach of the University of Louisville Cardinals dominated statewide sports media. A former Calipari assistant for 10 years, Payne was a standout on UofL’s national championship team in 1986 and is considered a great recruiter and developer of college basketball players.
The UofL basketball program is in a down period, but I agree with those saying that Kenny Payne has the coaching skills and recruiting contacts to bring it back to national prominence.
If and when that happens, it could add to the heartache of BBN. Instead of aspiring to be the best in the country, the Cats could be challenged to remain even the best in Kentucky.
For those who like statistics, it has been seven years since the UK Wildcats played in the Final Four. That is more than 2,500 days.
In my opinion, Coach Cal has lost sight of the goal of winning an NCAA championship and now is more focused on being a talent scout for the NBA.
All along, I’ve believed that “one and done” had to do with the players who went to the NBA after a year or two in Lexington. I never realized that phrase might become a summary of Cal’s NCAA titles at UK.
Keith Kappes can be reached at keithkappes@gmail.com