{"id":85262,"date":"2025-03-10T21:31:34","date_gmt":"2025-03-11T02:31:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/mark-pope-doubles-down-on-kentuckys-desire-to-win-sec-tournament-thats-why-were-going-down-there\/"},"modified":"2025-03-10T21:31:34","modified_gmt":"2025-03-11T02:31:34","slug":"mark-pope-doubles-down-on-kentuckys-desire-to-win-sec-tournament-thats-why-were-going-down-there","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/mark-pope-doubles-down-on-kentuckys-desire-to-win-sec-tournament-thats-why-were-going-down-there\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Pope doubles down on Kentucky\u2019s desire to win SEC Tournament: \u201cThat\u2019s why we\u2019re going down there.\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mark Pope<\/a><\/strong> hasn\u2019t been shy about Kentucky<\/a>\u2018s goal entering postseason play, starting with the SEC Tournament in Nashville. It\u2019s the same message he shared during his introductory press conference in April, then the same one he shared ahead of the regular season finale at Missouri \u2014 a big-time road victory to tie the all-time record for most top-15 wins in college basketball history.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis SEC Tournament matters,\u201d Pope said last week.<\/a> \u201cIt\u2019s the best league maybe that\u2019s ever been in any year of college basketball, and this SEC matters. So, we\u2019re heading to Nashville with all of our successes and confidence and warts and holes that we got to plug and we\u2019re going there with one goal, which is to go win.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked about the team\u2019s trip to NashVegas on Monday \u2014 he actually asked Big Blue Nation to come up with a better nickname than that, so start workshopping one for this week \u2014 he made it clear they\u2019re not backing down from those expectations. <\/p>\n

If you\u2019re going to play in the best league in the history of the sport, why not bring home the hardware to make it worth your while? Some coaches say they \u2018don\u2019t care about the conference tournament\u2019 \u2014 and you know exactly who they are.<\/a><\/p>\n

Not this Kentucky coach.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to win. That\u2019s why we\u2019re going down there,\u201d Pope said during his call-in radio show Monday night. \u201cAnd that doesn\u2019t guarantee us the win, but we\u2019re very clear on that objective, and we understand how important this is and what it means to BBN and what it means to our guys. So we\u2019re going to go chase it as hard as we can. It\u2019s going to be a challenge from the get go. This league is so fantastic, but why would you want anything less?\u201d<\/p>\n

How are the Wildcats preparing for such a tournament, one featuring as many as 13 NCAA Tournament teams, according to the latest Bracketology? <\/a>The Kentucky coaching staff is actually preparing not one, not two, but three <\/em>scouting reports to get the team ready to roll in Nashville.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s actually busier than ever. We\u2019re doing three scouts,\u201d Pope said. \u201cWe\u2019re doing a pretty intensive self-scout right now and we\u2019re doing a scout on both Oklahoma and Georgia. So it\u2019s like three times the work. Luckily, we have a couple extra days to fill it in and it\u2019s fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why you do what you do, why you take on this job. It\u2019s hard and exhausting, but the reward is something you could never buy. It\u2019s a fulfilling reward just four wins away, starting Thursday night in Nashville.<\/p>\n

And then from there, it\u2019ll be six wins away from hanging banner No. 9 \u2014 the assignment from day one. That opportunity is something this team is not taking for granted. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the best time of year. It just is,\u201d Pope said. \u201cIt\u2019s when magic things happen, so we\u2019re really excited to kind of get started.\u201d<\/p>\n

The post Mark Pope doubles down on Kentucky\u2019s desire to win SEC Tournament: \u201cThat\u2019s why we\u2019re going down there.\u201d<\/a> appeared first on On3<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mark Pope hasn\u2019t been shy about Kentucky\u2018s goal entering postseason play, starting with the SEC…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-85262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85262\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}