In the past 12 months Kentucky basketball has run the gamut of emotions in a way few programs (possibly in history) ever have. Reflecting on where the Big Blue Nation has been since this time last year requires a seat belt and a willing suspension of disbelief.
Approximately one year ago this week, Cat fans were riding high. Kentucky had re-entered the AP Top 25 on Jan. 26th for the first time all year on the back of a five-game winning streak to start SEC play and 11 victories in their past 12 tries, with the only loss coming on a last second shot at eventual Big East champion Louisville.
Rebirth or False Omen?
Just the week before, Kentucky had fired off a national salvo in an 18-point victory at highly regarded Tennessee. In that historic triumph, a primetime ESPN audience witnessed Jodie Meeks break Dan Issel’s single game school scoring record by dropping 54 points on 10 threes, an array of dazzling drives and a perfect 14-14 night from the free throw line.
At that moment, UK had seemingly exorcised the ugly legacy of the controversial Tubby Smith ouster, a string of embarrassing Rupp Arena losses to the likes of VMI and Gardner-Webb, and a general slide toward mediocrity over the last half decade.
Some pundits, who we will graciously neglect to mention here, even began touting Kentucky as an SEC title contender and a darkhorse Final Four threat. And at least for a week or two, the subtle, creeping rot of the now forgettable Billy G era still lay dormant and unseen.
A Black Hole
As tends to happen to programs rife with poor leadership and off-court drama, those happy times were short lived and in the ensuing eight weeks, the other shoe dropped…and dropped, and dropped again.
Without rehashing the dark days in great detail, suffice it to say that the 2008-‘09 Cats tanked, losing 8 of 11 games after debuting in the AP poll, fizzling out of the SEC tournament early and missing the NCAAs for the first time since the late ‘80s probation era. After an uninspiring double digit loss to Notre Dame in the NIT, Coach Billy Clyde was fired and Kentucky was left in a complete state of uncertainty.
How bad did it get? A promising incoming recruiting class began to reconsider their commitments. UK’s top candidate Billy Donovan publicly rejected any interest in the coaching vacancy, and leading scorers Patrick Patterson and Meeks openly weighed their NBA options. In addition, a costly and debilitating lawsuit by Gillispie loomed. Overall, on March 28, 2009, the Kentucky men’s basketball program was a shambles.
Only four days later, ironically on April Fool’s Day, UK formally announced the hiring of John Calipari, and in just the span of one short press conference the chaos and dread of the preceding weeks began to dissipate.
Emotional 180
Within days, Coach Cal convinced Memphis commits Darnell Dodson and DeMarcus Cousins to come to Lexington, then signed top 20 PG Eric Bledsoe, while maintaining Gillispie commitments from Kentucky Mr. Basketball Jon Hood and bluechip center Daniel Orton. The big news came about six weeks after Cal’s hiring—consensus top HS player John Wall would play college hoops for the Wildcats.
Though Meeks declared for NBA early entry, Patterson decided to stay and two months after reaching an epic nadir, Kentucky suddenly boasted an array of personnel to rival, on talent alone, any college hoops roster of the past 10 years.
Calipari didn’t stop there. Endearing himself to the program, the oft-stigmatized coach went on a state-wide campaign march, promising a return to glory to fans across the Commonwealth. It wasn’t all roses, however, as Cal’s name came up in multiple speculative articles about his alleged missteps at Memphis and UMass, where NCAA sanctions have tarnished his rep.
But UK found its way into the preseason top 10 in nearly every imaginable poll, and things were looking promising by the time football season started.
A Return to Prominence
The 2009-’10 Cats got the season going like a cannon shot—winning both blowouts and nail biters in spectacular fashion. John Wall needed one game to become household name material in the college b-ball zeitgeist, and the rest of the supporting cast showed flashes.
Then the Cats stepped up an early season of impressive potential by making believers out of the mainstream media. Wins over defending champs North Carolina and UConn in Madison Square Garden drew accolades, while victories vs. traditional powers Indiana and Louisville added polish. UK steamrolled through the holiday season and worked its way up the polls, all the while providing Sportscenter top plays material with regularity.
What next?
That brings us up to present day—an 18-0 team with a hot 3-0 start to the SEC schedule (almost sounds a little familiar). With a win this Saturday over former UK great John Pelphrey’s Arkansas Razorbacks—a game, by the way, in which UK will be heavily favored—Kentucky will become the No. 1 team in the nation for the first time in the regular season since 1996, and it will come exactly 52 weeks after UK’s ill-fated poll debut from last year.
Truthfully, though this season still has a ways to go, such a milestone would represent a full circle of fortunes. But if this retrospective tells us anything, let it be that greatness can come in a flash, and be taken away even quicker. Win or lose Saturday, Cat fans would be wise to remember that.
