Written By: Lukas Witt, Sports View America Freelance Writer
No, It’s not the Pope you’re thinking of, it’s actually Mark Pope Kentucky’s newest head coach. The Mark Pope era is starting off with a bang as Sunday he was announced as Kentucky Basketball’s 23rd head coach in front of a wild 20K+ fans inside Rupp Arena. In his introductory press conference which saw many fans getting to Rupp early and lining up outside, there were even some 5K or so fans not able to get into the arena, that watched on monitors from the lobby area. On that day a bus carrying members and players from the 1996 National Championship team along with other Kentucky teams entered the arena to a loud standing ovation, last off the bus was 1996 member, team captain and newly announced head coach Mark Pope with the championship trophy in his left hand which resembled him arriving at Rupp in 1996 to celebrate that same championship year earlier.
After a very well received reception by fans, former players, and donors Mark Pope didn’t wait to start putting together a staff and roster. Pope began contacting some of the best transfer portal recruits and also contacted players still left undecided on last year’s Kentucky team such as Zvonimir Ivisic, Adou Thiero, Jordan Burks, and Reed Sheppard. Pope also contacted some of the incoming recruits for next season such as Jayden Quaintance, Boogie Fland, and Travis Perry unknown if they were contacted are Billy Richmond, Somto Cyril, and Karter Knox.
In Pope’s first few days not all were full of sunshine and rainbows Kentucky lost a couple players to the transfer portal including Zvonimir Ivisic and DJ Wagner but also lost 2024 commits Jayden Quaintance, Boogie Fland, Billy Richmond, Somto Cyril, and Karter Knox. The lone recruit left was 4 star in-state 5000 point scoring guard Travis Perry. Later in the week former BYU commit to Pope in the 2022 recruiting class followed him to Kentucky in Collin Chandler who was a top 35 player in 2022 but will be a freshman this year because Chandler was on Mormon Mission in Sierra Leone and reassigned to London and set to return home May 2nd. Zvonimir Ivisic later followed coach John Calipari who was one of his influences in bringing the Croatian Sensation to Lexington for this past season. DJ Wagner is also expected to follow Cal to Arkansas as well as some members of the ‘24 recruiting class previously committed to Kentucky. Most recent departures are that of Joey Hart who will be joining Ball State and coach Michael Lewis and Ketucky’s beloved Reed Sheppard who announced he will be chasing his dream of playing in the NBA and not returning to Kentucky for his sophomore season.
Let’s talk portal side of things, Kentucky has reached out to a couple of high level players for next year’s roster but Pope has lasered in on top 20 Indiana decommit Liam McNeely a product of a stacked Montverde Academy in Florida who is coming off a Chipotle Nationals Championship, the five star recruit and McDonald’s All-American has received interest from UConn, Kansas, and a return to Indiana. KSR’s Matt Jones stated Wednesday night that Mark Pope and McNeely were on a zoom call that night. Kentucky has also reached out to several transfers listed below who are reported targets by Pope and his Staff. BYU assistant coach Cody Fueger will join Pope’s staff at Kentucky, Fueger is one of the best offensive assistants in the country and is already on the recruiting trail.
Transfer Portal Targets per KSR’s Jacob Polacheck
- G Koby Brea, Dayton
- G Javon Small, Oklahoma State
- G Otega Oweh, Oklahoma
- G Jeremy Roach, Duke
- G David Coit, Northern Illinois
- G Aidan Mchaney, Saint Mary’s
- G Brendan Hausen, Villanova
- G Pop Isaacs, Texas Tech
- G/F Andrew Carr, Wake Forest
- G/F Cade Tyson, Belmont
- G/F Andrej Stojakovic, Stanford
- F Baba Miller, Florida State
- F TJ Bamba, Villanova
- F/C Aly Khalifa, BYU
- F/C Amari Williams, Drexel
- F/C Great Osobor, Utah State
- F/C Brandon Garrison, Oklahoma State
- C Jonas Aidoo, Tennessee
The KY Press 