Mark Pope wants more matchups added to the college basketball regular season. This longer season wouldn’t consist of any matchups, however. Pope wants his Kentucky Wildcats playing the best of the best each season.
Pope has already scheduled a couple strong exhibition games to begin the season in the place of the local talent they used to play in late October. However, he wants to find a way to place these matchups in the actual non-conference schedule. Logistics and revenue issues are currently preventing this, Pope has found.
“Can we please extend the season?” Pope asked, speaking to KSR’s Matt Jones in a sit-down interview. “Because we get Purdue and Georgetown, which is awesome, but come on, man, let us do a home-and-home with Kansas. Like, why am I not going to Storrs (UConn) to play a game like we should be? We need some more flexibility to this. And also, let us get to Maui now. Part of the complication is that we make so much revenue off our home games that I’m locked into this 20-game home slate. We have to do that to pay the bills for us and for the athletic department, which is good.
“But bring on some more flexibility so we play some more games that every school can actually bring in some more revenue, that we can share with these student athletes, that we share with the rest of athletic department.”
Kentucky played 18 games and two exhibitions at Rupp Arena during Mark Pope’s first season coaching the Wildcats. Most of those games had sold out attendance, including all of the games played during UK’s slate against SEC competition. That’s not surprising given the fact that 14 teams made it to the NCAA Tournament from the conference, coupled with fanbase’s reputation of showing out for big-time matchups.
Currently, the Wildcats have not officially scheduled any matchups inside Rupp Arena this season. As of this report, the only games officially slated for the historic venue are the two October exhibitions against Purdue and Georgetown. Other than that, there are non-conference matchups schedule against Louisville on the road, and neutral site matchups against Michigan State, Gonzaga and St. John’s.
Of course, there will be 18 games played against SEC competition, meaning the Wildcats will have to schedule nine of those remaining home games against teams in their league. Counting the two exhibition games, there are nine more matchups to be played at Rupp Arena.
To be in the Maui Invitational, Kentucky may have to sacrifice other staples of their schedule like the CBS Sports Classic, or the State Farm Champions Classic if they’re worried about revenue made from home games.
It’s highly unlikely Pope’s suggestion of an extended season will be entertained by those in charge. However, Kentucky appears to be trying to find a way to work around these limitations in their non-conference schedule, and the Wildcats’ opponents this coming season are already looking to be must-see.
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