Fresh from a highly successful 10 years as Kentucky coach and newly armed with a so-called lifetime contract, John Calipari did not speak of a steady-as-she-goes plan for the future. Instead, he saw new challenges looming and his UK program needing to be ready to adapt.
"We're on our second tour of duty," he said this month. "Those 10 years are done. And you can almost see I'm feeling kind of rejuvenated. Here we go. Let's go on another 10-year run. Let's see how we can do. Let's see if we can do better. Let's see if we can continue to change."
The big change possible in the next few years is the expectation that players will be again allowed to go directly from high school to the NBA. And, of course, these players have been the foundation of Kentucky basketball under Calipari's leadership.
Of the brave new world ahead, Calipari said, "How do we stay on top?"
Calipari said he guessed that only five or six players a year will be capable of going from high school directly to NBA contracts. His concern is that other players will see themselves following that path. These players will see high school classwork as unimportant. When the NBA door closes, they will feel abandoned.
"None of us wanted to go to school," he said. "We wished we didn't have to go to school. But we went. I went because my parents said you're going to school because it's the only way you're making it."
He and his sisters were the first family members to get a college education, Calipari said.
Players who fall short of fulfilling their basketball dreams will find it difficult to turn to academics since they invested their futures in athletics, Calipari said. In terms of basketball, a season playing for Kentucky made the NBA more realistic.
"Was Anthony Davis ready to go from high school to the NBA? No," Calipari said. "No. Was Karl Towns? You saw him early in the year. Maybe John Wall was. Was Eric Bledsoe? Was Brandon Knight? I can go through all of our lottery picks, and tell you 90% of them were not ready to go to the NBA (out of high school)."
