Mark Pope is returning to Kentucky. The former college basketball player, who was the captain of the Wildcats’ 1996 national championship team, has been named the basketball program’s new head coach.
Pope replaces John Calipari, who recently departed Lexington to take the head coaching job at Arkansas.
The school announced Pope’s hiring in a release Friday morning but stopped short of revealing the terms of his contract. Pope’s introductory press conference is scheduled for Sunday at Rupp Arena.
Calipari guided Kentucky to its eighth NCAA championship in 2012. He also coached the Wildcats to four Final Four appearances in 15 years.
But Kentucky hasn’t returned there since going 38-1 in 2015. Calipari said he had decided to step down once he had realized that the basketball program was in need of “another voice.”
“The last few weeks, we’ve come to realize that this program probably needs to hear another voice, that the university as a whole has to have another voice giving guidance about this program that they hear, and the fans need to hear another voice. We’ve loved it here, but we think it’s time for us to step away and step away completely from the program.”
Pope was 110-52 in five seasons with the Cougars and went 23-11 in their first season in the Big 12 Conference. BYU is also coming off a second NCAA Tournament appearance in four years under Pope.
He was 77-56 before that in four seasons at Utah Valley and guided the Wolverines to consecutive runner-up finishes in the Western Athletic Conference his final two years. They reached the CBI quarterfinals both times.
