Much ado about nothing

If a basketball team preparing for a run at a ninth national title and a football team aiming for an SEC divisional championship weren’t enough, John Calipari and Mark Stoops decided to spice things up a bit this afternoon for all their passionate and rabid fans.

As you know, Calipari has been spearheading a campaign to build a new basketball practice facility for his program. Throughout the summer, the high-profile Hall of Fame coach has frequently hinted at all the money recently earmarked and spent on the numerous other programs on campus. With basketball being the flagship UK sport, he felt it was high time for his program to reap once again some of the spoils.

While basking in the comfort and opulence of his resort hotel suite in the Bahamas, Calipari went on the offensive again. In arguing his point, he took what many consider to be a shot at Kentucky’s up and rising football program.

“The reason is, this is a basketball school,” Calipari told reporters. “It’s always been that. Alabama is a football school. So is Georgia. I mean, they are. No disrespect to our football team. I hope they win ten games and go to bowls. At the end of the day, that makes my job easier, and it makes the job of all of us easier. But this is a basketball school. And so, we need to keep moving in that direction and keep doing what we’re doing.”

A few minutes after Kyle Tucker of The Athletic tweeted out Calipari’s quote, Mark Stoops responded with some biting sarcasm of his own.

“Basketball school? I thought we competed in the SEC?” Stoops said on Twitter. Stoops followed up his tweet with the hashtag “4straightpostseasonwins.”

As expected, social media immediately blew up. Kentucky football diehards, armed with pitchforks and torches, immediately went on the offensive, claiming Calipari was wrong to disparage the football team in such a dismissive manner.

You know what? They’re not wrong. But neither is Calipari, nor Stoops, nor anybody else with an opinion on this sticky topic.

When all is said and done, Kentucky IS A BASKETBALL SCHOOL. A rising tide floats all boats and over the years, the Kentucky Basketball Program has been an endless source of joy, pride, and financial riches for our beloved commonwealth. Mention University of Kentucky sports to anyone outside of the state and nobody thinks football, or baseball, or volleyball, or rifle, or tennis, or any other sport for that matter.

It’s always been basketball, and Calipari—as the leader of the program—is simply doing whatever he needs to be doing to make sure the program remains “the program with the greatest tradition in the history of college basketball.” You can’t fault a guy speaking with such passion and conviction.

And it’s not like Calipari’s ignored his gridiron compatriots or any of his other cohorts in the athletic department over his 14-year tenure either. He came in and set the bar high. He’s always been cooperative in recruiting and public relations. As a result, all the other athletic departments have benefitted tremendously on the coattails of Calipari’s self-professed (but immensely accurate) “Kentucky Effect.”

But neither is Stoops wrong either. Kentucky fans want and expect their head football coach to vigorously defend his turf. Over his 10-year tenure, Stoops has changed that turf from one of “laughingstock” to one of “laughing all the way to the bank.” He’s rightly upset to hear Calipari’s comments as his coaching staff continues to fight the other traditional football schools for the top recruits.

Did you really think, however, that either Calipari or Stoops would just simply bend over and kowtow to each other’s demands? They’re both simply doing what they’ve been paid to do—fight for their respective programs to make them the very best they can be.

Unfortunately, unless another Joe Craft-type benefactor comes down the pike, there won’t be enough money in the pot to fund everyone’s wishes. But it’ll be UK athletics director Mitch Barnhart weighing in on those important decisions. It won’t be you or me.

So, everybody chill. Don’t fret. Most importantly, don’t divide the fan base during this glorious time of gleeful anticipation. I guarantee you cooler heads will prevail. Calipari will laugh off his comments. He and Stoops will then find a way to walk back their little brouhaha, kiss and make up, and stroll hand in hand toward another run at championship glory.