Editor’s note: This is the first in a series of stories from Kentucky Today sports editor Keith Taylor’s exclusive interview with Kentucky men’s basketball coach Mark Pope.
By Keith Taylor
Kentucky Today
New Kentucky coach Mark Pope is all about winning national championships. He wants the Wildcats to develop the same mentality.
That’s why Pope designated last week’s training camp as “Banner Week” and wanted to instill into his squad the mission for the upcoming season. It was the third phase in a series of camps for Pope and the Wildcats, which included eight weeks of camp during the summer, a four-week session last month followed by “Banner Camp.”
“Our ultimate goal is to hang a banner — that’s our ultimate goal,” he said Wednesday. “Our focus every day is to get better. I like calling it ‘Banner Camp ‘because I like No. 9 being ever-present. I like banners being ever-present and somewhere floating around in our minds while we’re working hard to be focused on today.”
The Banner Camp, Pope said, is strictly “for us here” and “it’s our focus.”
“It’s very important to differentiate,” he said. “Our focus every day is to get better. Sometimes you can look so far off into the horizon that you aren’t super functional today. The only way to get to where you’re trying to go on the horizon is to have unbelievable work every day. I like this idea of (it) being totally in our consciousness of our goal.”
The first-year Kentucky coach added that he’s been impressed with his team’s ability to stay in the moment.
“It’s about the process,” he said. “One thing we can control is the progress we make today and our guys have been good at that so far. They’ve really been dialed into (each) day really well.”
The camp, a prelude to the start of practice, also gave Pope and his staff more insights into the team, a process that involved bonding on and off the court.
“What I’m most excited about is from Day 1, my guys continue to get better,” he said. “I have so many guys that have made incredible strides. Otega Oweh has made so much progress with his motor and his intentionality like, it’s awesome. Amari Williams has got so much more confidence, so much more physical, like every single day.”
Pope also has been impressed with the freshmen trio comprised of Travis Perry, Trent Noah and Collin Chandler. He said all three players “came in very humble, very excited, and super curious, which is a winning character trait.
“The guys that are insatiably curious are the guys that get better,” Pope said. “They just want to learn and grow and they just can’t get enough (and they are) like sponges and all three of those guys feel like that.”
The Kentucky coach added that the transformation has been rewarding to watch this summer.
“Those guys came in day one and felt like their heads were spinning and they were all over the map,” Pope said. “And (now) they’re functional basketball players already right now. It’s been really fun to watch guys grow. With a team that is as veteran as our team is, for guys still to be able to grow at this rate is exciting.
“That’s probably the thing I’ve learned most about the team is that we’re not even close to our ceiling. We can get better every day and these guys are doing it.”
