Assessing Mark Pope's first season at Kentucky ahead of SEC play

There were a lot of unknowns for Kentucky coming into the 2024-25 season after the departure of head coach John Calipari to Arkansas.

Compiling a record of 410-123 at Kentucky and leading the Wildcats to 32 NCAA Tournament wins, four Final Fours and a national title in 2012, Calipari left Lexington for Fayetteville after a disappointing end to his tenure with the Wildcats. 

After the COVID-impacted 2019-20 season and a shortened 2020-21 season, the last three full seasons under Calipari ended with two first-round NCAA Tournament exits to 15-seed Saint Peter's in 2022 and 14-seed Oakland in 2024. Kentucky fell to No. 3 seed Kansas State in the second round of the 2023 NCAA Tournament.

Those early tournament exits and inconsistent play opened the door for Pope, the former player and team captain of the 1996 national championship team under Rick Pitino, to return to his alma mater.

So far, there is a lot for Wildcat fans to be pleased with after an 11-2 record in non-conference play. A pair of top 10 wins over then-No. 6 Duke in the Champions Classic and a No. 7 Gonzaga team in overtime, have been the major highlights thus far, as well as a win over in-state rival Louisville.

The only downside to those two ranked wins, as well as the pair of losses to Clemson and Ohio State, was Kentucky having to play catch-up after falling behind. Kentucky faced a double-digit deficit in three of those four games and trailed at the half in each of them, which is major area of concern going into a daunting SEC schedule.

Two other key areas for Kentucky are points in the paint and three-point shooting. Against Duke and Ohio State in the paint, Kentucky was minus-20 (46-26) vs. the Blue Devils and minus-12 (36-24) against the Buckeyes. While Kentucky was 10-for-25 (40%) from three-point range in the win over Duke, the Wildcats have been held below 30% from long range in both losses, including a season-low 18.2% against Ohio State. 

Per TeamRankings, Kentucky attempts nearly 28 threes per game (27.5), which is 42nd in the nation. If the Wildcats can make a high percentage of those shots each game, that would at least keep the opposing team from having fast break opportunities and allow the defense to get in position.

According to Sports-Reference, Kentucky's offense (89 PPG) ranks third in the country while its defense (71.3 PPG) is 189th. In 2023-24, Pope's final season as BYU's head coach, the Cougars had the 22nd-ranked scoring offense (81.4 PPG) and 108th-ranked scoring defense (69.9 PPG), per 247 Sports' Aaron Gershon. 

As the 2024-25 season has progressed, it appears this year's Kentucky team has taken on a similar identity.

While the defense has failed to consistently get stops against stiffer competition, Pope's Wildcats have picked up some quality wins and taken care of business against mid-major opponents. 

In Calipari's final two seasons, Kentucky lost four non-conference games in 2022-23 and dropped three in 2023-24, including a loss to a UNC Wilmington team that went 21-10 and failed to reach the NCAA Tournament.

With six players averaging double figures and Andrew Carr (6.2 RPG) and Amari Williams (8.5 RPG) giving the Wildcats a presence under the basket, No. 10 Kentucky has a lot of potential the rest of the season.

Although the three-point shooting has been inconsistent at times and the defense could still use some improvement, Pope has Kentucky in a good position as it heads into a loaded SEC slate that currently includes nine other ranked teams, beginning with undefeated and No. 6 Florida (13-0) on Saturday.