John Calipari — the University of Kentucky Wildcats men’s basketball coach — went on NBC’s “The Dan Patrick Show” on Thursday, and it didn’t take long for the usually-level headed Coach Cal to totally lose his cool.
Calipari has been the face of “one-and-done” recruiting in college basketball, and this past season, he received plenty of flak for running a 10-man “platoon” system. It’s been a little over two months since his team lost to Wisconsin in the Final Four, and apparently it’s still a little bit of a sore subject. When Patrick asked Calipari if he regretted platooning his players instead of opting for the traditional 7-man rotation, the head Wildcat bared his fangs:
I don’t know. We didn’t go seven deep. We went ten deep and then we went nine deep… We almost won 40 games. And we were given a tough path in the NCAAs. Playing Notre Dame and Wisconsin, come on. Think about our path there.
If anybody wants to question me, like results, like ‘I don’t care about results’? The last six years have been a pretty good run. Now, maybe you think I should have won five national titles and been the next John Wooden. I don’t know. But I do know we were right there trying to win them every year. Didn’t do it. It’s hard to do.
After Cal’s brief rant, Patrick attempted to cut the interview short by saying he had other legends — “guys who actually won National Championships” — waiting to come on.
Naturally, John didn’t appreciate that.
In the next hour? I don’t know very many people who could stand you, that if you’d call, they would come on. So you must have some very good people working for you that people like.
WATCH:
Shots fired.
[h/t: Barstool, Sporting News]