At this moment in time, many UK fans are questioning their goals and have a sour taste in their mouths for what they saw from the Cats the last time on the floor. There was nothing positive that came out of the Ohio State game and I think it very much revealed the flaws with this team. In some ways, it’s a great test for Mark Pope in his first year because one area where most of us think he excels over John Calipari is team development. Whereas I think we would see the same performances game in and game out with Cal, with little adjustment, I would be shocked if we don’t see some new wrinkles moving forward. Mark Pope is not just gonna accept his team’s flaws and try to win with them.

But with that said, it’s still hard to not consider Pope’s first 12 games a wild success for the improvement of this program. Big wins on the national stage. Dominating performances at Rupp Arena. Continued control over the UL rivalry. Renewed fan enthusiasm. It’s been pretty much all roses for Pope so far.

SO HAVE THE GOALS CHANGED?

Before the season, the goals were not excessive. I think most people wanted a team not losing to obviously inferior opponents, solid coaching, and maybe a few wins at the SEC and NCAA Tournament. Nobody was clamoring for conference championships or Final Fours. But now this team has catapulted into the Top 5 with wins over Final Four contenders Duke and Gonzaga. They have shown flashes of being an offensive juggernaut. The fact they beat the Blue Devils and Bulldogs means they could, in theory, beat anybody. And at Kentucky, that kind of thinking leads fans to wanting a Final Four.

THEY SHOULDN’T

At least to me, the first season of the Mark Pope era was a program reset. A cleansing of sorts. Of course, I wouldn’t have been pleased with a losing season or anything of the sort, but I had winning games at the SEC Tournament and anything Sweet 16 or later as an overwhelming success. I wanted UK to become dominant at Rupp Arena again. nd I wanted to see a coach make adjustments and attempt to put his players in the best possible position to win. At this point, Mark Pope has either accomplished these goals, or have the Cats in line to accomplish them. Should they flame out in the Sweet 16, even as a better seed, I wouldn’t consider that a failure.

Now, those are just the Year 1 goals. Certainly, seeing the program do this well this quickly under Pope means the expectations will jump again in Year 2. And with a recruiting class likely headed to finish in the Top 5, there is no reason to expect any sort of dip next year.

LET’S TRY AND STAY IN REALITY

Bringing back a former player from a championship team, paired with beating Duke, gave so many visions of grandeur of an impending dynasty under Mark Pope. And maybe that happens at some point. But in some ways, I think the Ohio State game was a good thing to happen. It should have brought us all back to reality a little bit. This team has some significant holes. And they are holes that will be a struggle to conceal. But from where this program was sitting at the end of John Calipari, the goals we set when Mark Pope was hired, to today, things are going really well. We are about to see the toughest grind of conference games in school history. Even some really good teams would lose 6 or 7 games. We might lose 8-10 games.

But staying in reality and recognizing that Mark Pope has already proven to be a capable head coach for this program means you can really enjoy these next three months, even with some losses. Always remember what we wanted to see in Year 1 of the Mark Pope era before the first opening tip. And if you keep that mentality, we should have a very positive outlook for where the future of this program is headed.