Kentucky vs Louisville basketball new era: Mark Pope, Pat Kelsey fueling excitement early

Posted by Admin December 15, 2024 Basketball

LEXINGTON — “Where’s your ring at?”

About 90 minutes before tipoff between Louisville and Kentucky men’s basketball, champion point guard-turned-support staffer Peyton Siva had to endure heckling from a quintet of Kentucky fans.

Siva, a member of the Cards’ vacated 2013 national championship team, joined coach Pat Kelsey’s inaugural staff in April as director of player development and basketball alumni relations. Saturday marked Siva’s first trip back to Rupp Arena as a member of Louisville’s program since 2011. Had he somehow managed to forget how deep the Battle of the Bluegrass was, four shirtless men with the letters P-O-P-E painted on their abdomens and one guy in a blue-and-white Pope costume quickly reminded him.

As Siva pointed out a couple specks of red left of the student section, they chirped:

“Where’s your ring at?”

“It’s at home,” Siva replied. “I don’t wear it every day.”

“If this was really a rivalry,” he added, “y’all wouldn’t even have to say anything.”

Not satisfactory. The UK student section started booing Siva, who responded by pumping his arms up and down, encouraging more vitriol.

It’s a new era for the UK-U of L rivalry. If anyone knows, it’s Siva. Current Cards PG Chucky Hepburn likes reminding his predecessor he wasn’t even double-digit years old when Siva played for Louisville. If the years didn’t make it obvious, 2024-25 marks the first time since 1930 that both programs have first-year head coaches: Kelsey and Mark Pope.

While Pope’s team (now 10-1 as Louisville falls to 6-5) won the first meeting, 93-85, both coaches have given Cats and Cards fans reason to hope. Their charm, understanding of basketball history and modern approach to the sport have won over the state.

Every time Kelsey pumps gas into his car or goes out to eat in Louisville, he hears the same line from Cards fans.

“Hey, coach, how you doing? You gonna beat Kentucky this year?”

Pope had the benefit of experiencing the rivalry as a player at UK from 1994-96. He blocked the two-point loss his junior year from memory until unlocking it Friday night (which prompted the 52-year-old to break into a “teary sweat” remembering how he had to share the bus ride back to Lexington with coach Rick Pitino). His senior year, which ended with an NCAA title, Kentucky defeated U of L by 23 at home.

But Saturday was Kelsey’s first time. He tries to be the kind of coach who leads by example, blocking out distractions and staying in the moment with his team. But the pageantry — and no doubt the 21,093 fans reportedly in attendance — must have hit Kelsey like a Mack Truck.

After the game, Kelsey described UK-U of L as “one of the really cool rivalries in all of American sports.” Louisville graduate senior Terrence Edwards Jr. said he wishes he could play in it again next year.

“Three-hundred and sixty-five days till the next time we play again, and I’m going to be reminded about 4 million times when that game is coming up,” Kelsey said. “And we’ll be looking forward to it.”

“I know Pat is the perfect hire to put the pieces back together again,” ESPN’s Seth Greenberg told The Courier Journal, reflecting on Cards hoops post Chris Mack’s resignation, “to utilize the resources that Louisville has, to bring an energy and an ownership and enthusiasm and positive spin on almost anything and everything, and to be accessible.”

Out in Lexington, fans initially doubted Pope after 15 years of John Calipari. (In fact, neither Pope nor Kelsey was their school’s first choice.) His résumé gave folks pause. In nine seasons at Utah Valley and BYU, Pope never won an NCAA Tournament game or assembled a top recruiting class.

But he had nostalgia on his side. And worked hard to win the offseason. Now the Wildcats are in the middle of their best start since 2016-17.

“We may have just gotten one of the great young, up-and-coming coaches by accident,” Richie Farmer, former UK player and Kentucky’s 1988 Mr. Basketball, told The Courier Journal. “You’ve got to give (athletics director) Mitch Barnhart a lot of credit for that. He was a great hire. Well, I think he was the perfect hire, actually.”

Kelsey inherited a Louisville program coming off two of its worst seasons in modern history. At 49 years old, Kelsey has an old-school edge to him — evident in sayings like “Culture eats strategy for lunch,” a gem from his introductory news conference. Cut with his modern approach to leading young men, it’s pretty endearing.

“Mark Pope and Pat Kelsey totally get it,” Terry Meiners, Louisville radio host of over 40 years, told The Courier Journal. “They’re the coaches, but they listen before they squawk at the players.”

Take Chucky Hepburn, Kelsey’s point guard.

He averaged 9.2 points, 3.9 assists, 3.3 rebounds and 2.1 steals per game as a junior at Wisconsin. After a near triple-double vs. then-No. 15 Indiana and a 30-piece vs. West Virginia at the Battle 4 Atlantis, he’s now regarded as one of college basketball’s best on-ball defenders.

“I love playing with this team,” Hepburn said after the West Virginia game. “It’s probably the most confidence I’ve ever had in college. Just having the ball in my hands, and to be able to have a coaching staff and teammates that believe in you. That gives me even more confidence to show that I’m one of the best point guards in the country.”

Like Kelsey, Pope made quick use of the transfer portal to build his roster, signing nine players with previous collegiate experience: guards Koby Brea, Lamont Butler, Kerr Kriisa, Otega Oweh and Jaxson Robinson, forwards Ansley Almonor, Andrew Carr and Amari Williams and center Brandon Garrison. Those veterans helped secure Pope’s first signature win Nov. 12 over then-No. 6 Duke.

After the victory, Pope entrusted graduate forward Carr to make the opening statement. He thanked the Kentucky fans in attendance, credited Pope for encouraging the players to turn to each other at halftime, and gave his teammate Oweh a shoutout for his game-sealing offensive rebound.

“Nice work,” Pope told Carr, patting him on the leg. “That was excellent.”

Oweh then fielded a question about what Pope told him before he went out and nabbed a steal at the end of the game.

“He trusts in me to make those type of plays, and I trust in myself to make those type of plays,” Oweh said. “We did share a moment, but he just told me to go be me.”

Pope turned to Oweh.

“That sounds really intimate,” Pope said. “‘We shared a moment.’ I like that.”

“Come on,” Pope added as he put his arm around Oweh. The guard smiled and dropped his head shyly. “Come on, man, ahaha.”

Kelsey’s and Pope’s zeal is reflected in the way their teams play. Both have created cultures of togetherness, trust and belief in their whys.

“Identity’s immediate,” Greenberg said. “Culture takes time. I think they’ve done a really good job in both.”

Bellarmine coach Scott Davenport served as an assistant for Crum and Rick Pitino at Louisville. He knew of Pope as a player and coached against him at BYU. Kelsey hired Davenport’s son, Doug, to work on his staff at Winthrop.

Davenport has immense respect for Pope and Kelsey. Having grown up just five blocks from U of L’s campus and been part of the rivalry for nearly two decades, Davenport feels both coaches are great for the game. They are knowledgeable, passionate.

But what sets them apart, Davenport believes, is how they make others better.

“They put the players first,” Davenport told The Courier Journal. “… No matter (how) you break the game down, they excel by putting the players first. And I think that’s a trait all great coaches have.”

In an effort to pack KFC Yum! Center for Louisville’s game versus Tennessee on Nov. 9, Kelsey took to U of L’s campus.

He power-walked through sidewalks and a dining hall asking students if they planned to attend. He clapped, pointed and shouted, motivating them to come out and show support as though he was orchestrating a pick-and-roll from the sideline. In between pleas, Kelsey made small talk, heckling students for the NFL team logos they wore and taking selfies.

“I think that Louisville, and Kentucky, people want to see them,” Greenberg said. “They wanna touch them. They want to feel like they know them. They want to connect with them. And I think that Pat’s approach and his accessibility, Mark’s approach and his accessibility, will pay dividends.”

Louisville sold 1,802 student ticket memberships for Louisville football and men’s basketball this year, marking the first sellout since 2015. While U of L lost handily to Tennessee, the student section was full of white T-shirts and plastic Tom Ford replicas. The arena surpassed 15,000 spectators for the third time in three years, with an announced attendance of 16,976.

Pope understands the importance of being seen as well as any coach in college basketball.

On Friday, Kentucky unveiled new warmup gear from famed rapper and UK hoops fan Drake’s NOCTA line with Nike. The Wildcats recreated a 10-year-old viral photo from when Drake visited Lexington during his “Nothing Was the Same” era — when the youngest of UK’s 2024-25 roster were still in elementary school. Pope made the upper left quarter of the shot.

Regardless of whether the photoshoot was his idea, Pope has a knack for using social media to connect with fans. During his postgame radio show Wednesday after Kentucky’s 78-67 victory over Colgate, Pope talked about wishing he could move his post-surgery FaceTime call with the injured (and drowsy) Kriisa to Instagram live “so we can all enjoy this moment.”

“I’m just not technologically savvy enough to do it, so I apologize for that,” Pope added. “I’ll work on that in the future.”

Early wins on and off the court for U of L and UK bolstered goodwill. Soon-to-follow obstacles provided valuable (and necessary) learning opportunities. Charisma can only take a coach so far.

“If you win, no matter what you say, they’re gonna say you’re doing the right thing,” Davenport said. “If you lose, it’s gonna be the wrong thing. It’s a very objective-based business. They keep score every night.”

After the Cards returned from the Battle 4 Atlantis, fifth-year forward Kasean Pryor was sidelined for the season with a torn ACL, as was Koren Johnson (shoulder surgery). Louisville has been without Johnson and forward Aboubacar Traore (broken left arm) since the Nov. 19 win over Bellarmine. The Cards are down to eight available scholarship players.

Louisville lost to Ole Miss, 86-63, its first game back at the Yum!. U of L then fell to Duke, 76-65, last Sunday despite a solid first-half lead.

“Obviously there’s a little bit of an adjustment period as we have the new normal of what our roster looks like,” Kelsey said after the loss to Ole Miss. “But that’s no excuse for why we lost tonight… We addressed some things in the locker room. The guys will show up tomorrow. They’ll have unbelievable attitudes and pursue preparation for Duke with great excellence.”

After UK defeated Georgia State, 105-76, on Nov. 29 at Rupp Arena, Pope stayed for his postgame radio show. He then regretfully informed Cats fans who’d stuck around for autographs that he had to leave and hop on a scout. As a consolation, he turned to his wife Lee Anne and announced that she dropped off her credit card at the Taylor Belle’s soft-serve ice cream stand.

“Enjoy the ice cream on us,” Pope told the crowd.

During his call-in radio show Dec. 2, Pope said the bill came out to more than $2,000.

Then Kentucky fell to unranked Clemson the next day. Tigers fans stormed their home court. UK was simply out-gritted.

Reflecting on the loss Dec. 5, Pope said “I actually have more confidence in this team after the game than I did before, which is a terrible, terrible thing to say here (at UK). … I liked the response yesterday as we cranked out the film. We had a bunch of guys that were curious and eager and wanted to get better.”

Kentucky responded with a statement come-from-behind 90-89 overtime win over Gonzaga on Dec. 7 that has experts touting the Wildcats as NCAA title contenders. But they lost Kriisa (foot surgery) for a portion of the season in the process.

The story through November and December won’t be the same come March and April. But both head coaches have managed to create a kind of buy-in at their programs that feels necessary to thrive during postseason basketball. In time we’ll know.

Reach college sports enterprise reporter Payton Titus at ptitus@gannett.com, and follow her on X at @petitus25.