John Calipari regularly attracts the best high school prospects in the nation.
In his seven years as Kentucky’s men’s basketball coach, the Wildcats have posted five No. 1 recruiting classes and finished second the other two years.
But there are some people that believe that talent on the recruiting trail doesn’t follow Calipari to the sidelines.
Rick Barnes doesn’t follow that train of thought.
“I think he is a great basketball coach,” the first-year Tennessee coach said. “(People who think otherwise), that is jealousy. People who try to say that he is not a good coach border on ignorant. I mean, John Calipari has won everywhere he has been, and he hasn’t always had the best players.”
Over the years, Barnes and Calipari have built a friendship.
When the UT head coaching position became available, Calipari was one of the first to pick up the phone and direct the 17-year coach at Texas to the Vols.
“I trust him to know that he would not tell me anything that he didn’t believe,” Barnes said. “He wouldn’t just say something to say it. His exact words were, “(UT) is one of the top jobs in this league and can be as good as any (job). You need to take that job. I don’t like the way you are being treated (at Texas), and I think you should take that job.’”
Shortly after, Barnes took the job and on Tuesday (TV: ESPN, 7:00 p.m.) the two winningest active head coaches in the SEC (total wins) meet inside Thompson-Boling Arena when the Vols (10-11, 3-5 SEC) face No. 20 Kentucky (16-5, 6-2).
The Vols have dropped two consecutive contests against Alabama and TCU. In both contests UT held a lead of 15 points or more in the second half.
“I think what it gets down to, as much as anything, is how do we handle adversity when we’re playing well, understanding the game well enough to have enough respect for the game, knowing that we’re in a league and we’re playing against teams that are going to fight back and they’re not just going to go away,” Barnes said.
“When that happens, when they start coming back, how do we respond? That’s what we haven’t done a really good job of.”
Kentucky, on the other hand, has won three of its last four with an average margin of victory of 23 points.
“I think their chemistry has been good,” Barnes said. “I think that’s the one thing, the fact that they’ve got terrific guard play … He’s going to keep fiddling around with it, and meshing it together, and figuring out what works. If it means shortening your bench to do that, he’ll do that. They’ve just continued to improve.
“When you think of Kentucky, they’ve got to be on every night. Some kids take a little bit longer trying to figure that out. I don’t care how many stars you put by a recruit’s name. They come in, it’s never as easy as they thought it would be.”
A big part of that terrific guard play has been sophomore point guard Tyler Ulis, who has scored at least 20 points in eight of UK’s last 10 games.
“When you are five-foot-nine and getting done what he is getting done, I think you have to put big-time competitor in front of that,” Barnes said. “He is fearless … He can shoot it deep. When you can shoot it deep and are that quick, you become very hard to guard. If you get out there too far, he has explosive speed to get by you.”
