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An NCAA Tournament Without Fans, Positives and Negatives

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Wednesday afternoon, the NCAA made the decision to play the NCAA Tournament with only “essential staff and limited family attendance”, effectively banning spectators in an effort to contain the spread of COVID-19.

Put aside your thoughts on the COVID-19, aka the coronavirus, it is the biggest topic in the world has now banned hundreds of thousands of fans from the NCAA tournament.

Now that this is a reality, let’s take a closer look at the potential positives and negatives of the NCAA’s decision.

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Positives

Fewer Upsets?

The randomness and absurdity of the NCAA Tournament is unlike any other sporting event, hence “March Madness”, but could this be the ‘chalkiest’ tournament ever?

The NCAA Tournament is the biggest stage that most of the 68 teams will play on and would feature more fans they have ever played in front of. The fans are key in creating that notable and passionate college basketball environment.

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There are 63 games and there will still be upsets, but without the fans, I don’t think there will be nearly as many. Players and coaches from Power Five conferences will be more calm, cool, and collected without the external effect of the crowd and will lead to less chaos.

Better Officiating?

In SEC play this season, we have seen the worst officiating in the country, which is proven here. W

It’s no secret, most officials are influenced by the crowd and while it’s not right, it is the human element of officiating. No official wants to be

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Uniqueness

There has never been a sporting event as large as the NCAA Tournament to be played without fans, but now that is a reality.

Just to think, next week we are going to be watching games with practically no fans, meaning we can hear nearly everything from the court. That could be a problem for the NCAA

Negatives

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Kentucky Without the Homecourt Advantage

There is one constant, the Big Blue Nation, and they travel in groves to support their Cats in March. This gives Kentucky a home-court advantage nearly everywhere they go, but this year is going to be different.

No Crowd Shots

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Win or lose, March Madness brings the best of fans and one of the best parts of March is the crowd shots.

Economic Impact

The most obvious impact of the

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SEC Player of the Year, Immanuel Quickley, isn’t a fan.

One thing is for sure, this cements this season as the weirdest college basketball season ever.

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John Calipari and Mitch Barnhart Share Details of Their Meeting, “Exit Strategy”

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John Calipari and Mitch Barnhart sit down and discuss the future of the Kentucky Wildcats men's basketball program.

The talk of the town the last few days has been of the meeting between John Calipari and Kentucky Athletic Director Mitch Barnhart. One fan even created a Twitter/X account dedicated to tracking Calipari’s plane from New Jersey to Lexington.

The meeting finally took place on Tuesday afternoon at Barnhart’s farm. Afterward, Kentucky Insider quickly learned that Calipari would be returning for his 16th season as coach of the Kentucky Wildcats, with some changes. There are rumors of what changes are coming, but we are confident that there will be some staff/support staff changes and some day-to-day, operational changes.

Less than twenty-four hours removed from that meeting, the two discussed the details in a pre-recorded interview with LEX18.

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Barnhart started the interview by putting to bed the rumor that he and Calipari have “no relationship”, pointing out that both he and Calipari are part of 40+ year marriages, and have worked together going on 16 years.

“We know how to manage relationships,” Barnhart said. “This notion that we have no relationship is garbage… I’m not a guy that gets in coach’s business, and they will all tell you that. At the end of the day, I trust him (Calipari) to do his job. Let’s put the notion of no relationship out the door.”

So what did they talk about in the meeting? “We talked about things we want to get better at. The elephants in the room,” Barnhart said. The biggest elephant in the room has been the lack of success from the Kentucky basketball program over the last four seasons, despite a number of talented players coming in.

“Our fans know what the standard is. We know what the standard is. The mantle of what we have been entrusted with is critically important to us. We talked about that,” Barnhart said. How do we change that dynamic in a world of NIL, transfer portal, older rosters?”

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Calipari says, “We gotta get older,” and it sounds like he will be doing so, combining young and veteran talent, rather than being reliant on one or the other.

“There have been teams that have taken a bunch of transfers. One year they did okay, the next year they fell flat on their face,” (cough, cough, Arkansas) Calipari said. “With the current environment, you can’t have five freshmen starting. If you have freshmen, they’ve got to be supplemented with some veteran, talented players.”

Barnhart is confident in the guy who he hired 15 years ago can adjust to the current landscape of college basketball.

“If there has even been a person that has been able to adapt and adjust in the game, Cal has,” Barnhart said. I remember when he first came here, he made the comment, ‘We’re going to have to adapt to this new era of ‘one and done’.’ He adapted. We will have to adapt and just to a new world of NIL and transfers.”

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Barnhart and Calipari also discussed the absence of defense and toughness from recent teams, and it will adjust how Calipari uses the summer.

“I’ve never worked on defense in the summer. Now, I’m looking at this summer and say this may be where we try to get the foundation set defensively,” Calipari said. “Toughness. Some of it is recruiting toughness. I think the class we are bringing, a bunch of these guys have more toughness to their game.”

It’s clear, that both Barnhart and Calipari, who are in the twilight of their careers, want to end on a positive note. Now on more common ground, they will look to make changes in hopes that it pays off with postseason success.

“Not a lot of people in our industry get to exit the way you want to exit. I want us to be able to exit well and be able to say we left it (Kentucky basketball) in a really good spot for the people that came behind us.”

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Men's Basketball

Everything Players and Staff Had to Say after Losing to Oakland

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© Gregory Fisher-USA TODAY Sports

Well, Kentucky’s 2023-24 season is over after getting upset in the first round of the NCAA Tournament to 14-seed Oakland. A lot of questions are surrounding the Kentucky basketball program.

Head coach John Calipari and players let all of the sadness out and spoke on the touching subjects after the loss.

John Calipari

Calipari really felt like this team was built March. “They shouldn’t be and our team and our season, defined by that game, but it will be. This one is painful. … This team, I really felt was built for this moment, even though we were young.”

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Calipari says the mistakes from the team was due to the youth. “We made some critical mistakes at critical times today. When you have a really young team and look at where did the mistakes come from, they were freshmen.” When asked if his philosophy will change moving forward, Calipari says he doesn’t know, but he has changed lives doing it the way he is. “”I’ve done this with young teams my whole career. It’s gonna be hard for me to change that because we’ve helped so many young people … I don’t see myself just saying, ‘Ok, we’re not going to recruit freshmen.’ … We have an unbelievable group coming in.”

It was clear, though, that Calipari really believed that this team could have done something special. “I just come back to, I hate it for these guys that people try to define this season by that game, and it’s natural and it’s how this business works but this group was a ball to coach.”

Players

Then, it was the players’ turns to talk with the media, and as you can imagine, it was a devastated locker room. Tre Mitchell, one of the veterans on the team, appreciated his time at Kentucky. “I’ve loved every single second of being at Kentucky. I got an opportunity to live out a dream, and I built bonds with people that will last a lifetime.”

Reed Sheppard was very emotional after the game, talking about how this team was fun to play with, and it being their last time on the court together. “It sucks losing, but it sucks losing knowing it’s your last time playing with this group. This group has been unbelievable. There’s no team that’s been like this on/off the court. We’re all super close. Being able to play at Kentucky and have a special group of guys around me.”

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Sheppard continued on how “special” this Kentucky team was. “You guys could tell how special we were. How close of friends we were on and off the court. It sucks ending the season no matter what. Especially with this group. We’re all really close. We’re all best friends. Knowing that we won’t play with the same group of guys next year is tough. But you know, we have a lot of memories.”

Rob Dillingham also expressed that same comradery feeling. “It means everything to me. I might not show it all the time, but I love everybody on the team. I love putting this (Kentucky) jersey on. Every time I go out there I get chills looking at the crowd. It’s just crazy to think we’re done right now.”

Just like that, Kentucky’s season has come to a shocking halt. A special team ended with a very disappointing March. Now, big questions will need to be answered .

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Men's Basketball

SEC Coach Compares Rob Dillingham to NBA All-Star

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One SEC coach compares Rob Dillingham to an accomplished NBA All-Star.
Jordan Prather-USA TODAY Sports

You will be hard-pressed to find a more entertaining player in college basketball than Rob Dillingham, with opposing players and coaches saying as much throughout the season. Vanderbilt head coach, Jerry Stackhouse, is the most recent to do so.

Following a loss to Kentucky, where Rob Dillingham scored 23 points and 5 assists, Stackhouse complimented Dillingham and his style of play, even describing him as his “shifty”, the moniker he goes by on social media, ‘Rob wit da shifts’.

“I would say he is so shifty. I think that’s the word that I would describe him, and I saw him in high school,” Stackhouse said. “He’s the guy that’s capable of exploding and going for 25 or 30 on any given night. I think that’s why you’re seeing him projected on the draft boards and his own because he has that type of ability.”

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There is one NBA guard in particular that Dillingham reminds him of, former NBA All-Star and champion Kyrie Irving.

“Being able to play one-on-one, create off the dribble kind of Kyrie Irving-like,” Stackhouse said. “I think once he continues to grow as a defender, he’s going to be a guy that you try to pick on, but I think he has to that same shift in this that he has on offense he can apply that and become a good on-ball defender as well.”

Considering Stackhouse’s experience as an NBA All-Star caliber player, and now as an NBA/college coach for the last decade, his compliment holds value. That said, his praise didn’t stop there.

Stackhouse also mentioned that this Kentucky team is arguably the best he has seen since he started at Vanderbilt in 2019. “Kentucky is really good, talented offensive team,” Stackhouse said. “The best that I’ve seen I think since I’ve been here. …I think it’s time for a big run this year (for Kentucky).”

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