Speaker 1: Welcome to the Big Loon. Sader Dick Gabriel with you
Speaker 1: on a Friday, just ahead of the big day. Arkansas
Speaker 1: Kentucky not as big as we thought it might be. Right,
Speaker 1: we thought when the schedule was first released, everybody looked
Speaker 1: to see where the Arkansas game fell on the schedule.
Speaker 1: We really thought, I really believe fans media like probably
Speaker 1: if you held them down, the coaches would admit they
Speaker 1: really thought that this Arkansas game. And they're all tough,
Speaker 1: but it would match a Kentucky team trying to fight
Speaker 1: its way through the league in an Arkansas team that
Speaker 1: might be contending for one of the top four spots
Speaker 1: in the SEC tournament, not the championship. They weren't good enough,
Speaker 1: but no, they're really struggling and they've lost their best player,
Speaker 1: Boogie Flan. But as soon as they lost him, they
Speaker 1: won their first conference game, the Razorbacks did. So you
Speaker 1: don't know what's going to happen. Maybe they come in
Speaker 1: here and throw in every shot that they put up. Doubtful,
Speaker 1: but we do know it'll be dramatic. It'll be you know,
Speaker 1: John Caliperry show the Return. I want you to talk
Speaker 1: about that today because we talked about it yesterday and
Speaker 1: it's probably even talked about enough. But Rick Patino weighed
Speaker 1: in from his office up at Saint John's.
Speaker 2: Hello, Big Blue Nation. I didn't steer you wrong with
Speaker 2: Mark Pope when I sent out that last video, and
Speaker 2: I certainly won't steer you wrong with this video.
Speaker 1: Toughest day of.
Speaker 2: My coaching career at Louisville was when I had to
Speaker 2: walk into Upperna. Tried not to show it, but when
Speaker 2: I went home the reception, it taught me up apart
Speaker 2: because I loved that place so much. And it's interesting
Speaker 2: because I speaking and Cooley just recently about Providence and
Speaker 2: he said he almost was brought to tears because of
Speaker 2: the bad feelings he got going back there.
Speaker 1: But this is different.
Speaker 2: And as you all know, I'm not best friends with
Speaker 2: John cal Perry. I respect him certainly, but it was
Speaker 2: a mutual thing. The fans wanted to change John's read
Speaker 2: the tea leaves. He needed a change, and he really
Speaker 2: didn't want to leave. But what did he do for you?
Speaker 2: He brought the best talent in the history of the
Speaker 2: game of any university in America to Lexington. He also
Speaker 2: won a national championship he also was his style of
Speaker 2: play was extremely entertaining. So he's coming back on Saturday,
Speaker 2: and I want all of you to show the great
Speaker 2: class that you have, twenty three thousand plus people giving
Speaker 2: him a huge standing ovation, show him what respect and
Speaker 2: admiration's all about. I know you have the class I've
Speaker 2: always believed in. You do it once again.
Speaker 1: I have to admit I don't know why would he
Speaker 1: do this. I just can't figure it out. But what
Speaker 1: I think is interesting, first of all is that he
Speaker 1: did it. Secondly is that he admitted how much it
Speaker 1: tore him up to come back to rupp Arena with
Speaker 1: U of L. He was happy at U of L,
Speaker 1: but it tore him up. He said, to come to
Speaker 1: rupp Aerena because of course we stuck in Boston. In
Speaker 1: his brains handed to him realizing he had screwed up.
Speaker 1: He didn't get Tim Duncan. It's not going the way
Speaker 1: he hoped. Yeah, he was rich beyond his wildest dreams,
Speaker 1: but he wanted to win. Never came close in Boston.
Speaker 1: Could have won, in my opinion, you'd probably agree a
Speaker 1: couple more championships at Kentucky, but he screwed that up.
Speaker 1: Let it all, get away, comes back, does a really
Speaker 1: great job at U of l until the bitter end,
Speaker 1: and then he drops this. And the other thing that
Speaker 1: amazed me about this was when he said, you know,
Speaker 1: basically said, you know, we're not best buddies, him and
Speaker 1: John Caliperry, but to plead basically on Cali Perry's behalf.
Speaker 1: But I think part of that too was he wants
Speaker 1: the Big Blue Nation to be thought of in a
Speaker 1: good way, and if fans just cascade Rupp Arena with Booze,
Speaker 1: I think it's going to reflect poorly on this place
Speaker 1: that he loved so much. I thought that it's really
Speaker 1: interesting because I had forgotten this when I put together
Speaker 1: the documentary on the ninety six team they won the championship.
Speaker 1: You remember they beat U Mass in the final four,
Speaker 1: but U Mass had beaten Kentucky early in the year,
Speaker 1: second or third game of the year when Patino was
Speaker 1: playing Tony Delk and Jeff Shepard at the point instead
Speaker 1: of Anthony Epps, and Patino later said I lost that game,
Speaker 1: you know, by not playing the right people at point guard.
Speaker 1: When he moved Delk to the shooting guard and Epps
Speaker 1: to the point guard spot. It all fell into place.
Speaker 1: But after that game and Steve Moss and wk YT
Speaker 1: reminded me that we had this SoundBite in the archives.
Speaker 1: Here's a young John Calipery sounding like John Calipery basically
Speaker 1: telling Kentucky fans whom he would later call crazy and whatever.
Speaker 1: But as the UMass coach telling Kentucky fans how they
Speaker 1: are to treat their own coach. I just hold a
Speaker 1: game like this.
Speaker 2: The people in Kentucky don't go nuts their minds like
Speaker 2: they always do and think everything's all over the world's
Speaker 2: coming to it, and they've got a great basketball team.
Speaker 3: They've got a great basketball coach.
Speaker 2: Let him coach.
Speaker 1: Don't call the radio shows and tell him what his
Speaker 1: problems off. He'll figure it out.
Speaker 2: Leave them alone. He's the best there is in all
Speaker 2: of the profession, whether it's NBA, high school, college, whatever.
Speaker 4: It is, he's the best.
Speaker 1: And again, that was John Caliperry, then the UMass coach
Speaker 1: back in nineteen ninety five, after his team beat the
Speaker 1: Kentucky team that were going to beat them in the
Speaker 1: Final four and win the national championship. He might deny
Speaker 1: saying that about Rick Patino, but he certainly said it then,
Speaker 1: and he already knew what to expect from Kentucky fans
Speaker 1: when he got here. So it's just been interesting. I
Speaker 1: heard somebody in a press conference ask Pope about the
Speaker 1: fact that national pundits are telling Kentucky fans what to do.
Speaker 1: I've not witnessed that, and I certainly have not said
Speaker 1: anything about what people ought to do. I said, if
Speaker 1: you want to do him, go right ahead. Just keep
Speaker 1: in mind what he did. Why are you booing? And
Speaker 1: as I told somebody the other day, I said, people
Speaker 1: are booing. I think if they do because they're not
Speaker 1: mad that he went to Arkansas. I don't believe because
Speaker 1: Arkansas is not like Louisville or Tennessee. Yeah, it's a
Speaker 1: conference team. People are still mad at him because of
Speaker 1: the way he left the program, but those two bitter
Speaker 1: losses in the nca Tournament from teams that should have
Speaker 1: gone a lot farther. People are still angry about that
Speaker 1: and have lost whatever memory they should have, in my opinion,
Speaker 1: of what he did when he got here. And there
Speaker 1: are people who, to me on social media have dismissed
Speaker 1: what had happened here under Billy Gillespie. UK basketball had
Speaker 1: disintegrated to just like being just some other also ran
Speaker 1: program and Cala Perry brought it back unbelievably. Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: I screwed it up at the end, and it was
Speaker 1: his fault because he's stubborn and it's hurting him now
Speaker 1: at Arkansas in my opinion. But unbelievable job he did here.
Speaker 1: He gave you Kim fans exactly what they wanted for
Speaker 1: six years. They turn around gave him what they wanted
Speaker 1: when he left and left all that money on the table.
Speaker 1: So now Mark Pope's got to beat Arkansas. His team
Speaker 1: needs to jump up, find a way to beat the Razorbacks.
Speaker 1: Pope talked about the media and Caliperi and this and that,
Speaker 1: but he said, you know, at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: they got a game to win.
Speaker 5: At the end of the day, like, we have serious
Speaker 5: work to do. You know, we're we're This league is
Speaker 5: brilliant and wonderful and incredibly competitive, and every single team
Speaker 5: can win every single night, and you know, everybody's dealing
Speaker 5: with dynamics on their roster and injury and fatigue and
Speaker 5: frustration and growth and trying to make it through to
Speaker 5: position themselves in the best place they possibly can for
Speaker 5: the SEC Tournament and to make a run in the postseason,
Speaker 5: and and so that's what consumes most of our time.
Speaker 1: As well it should. It's a nine o'clock start. Ksar
Speaker 1: Boys begin at six thirty. Cameron and David seven thirty,
Speaker 1: Tom and Jack with the call. Got to stay up
Speaker 1: a little bit later to watch the Cats and the Razorbacks.
Speaker 1: The UK women get to win last night over number
Speaker 1: twenty two Alabama had to come from behind to do it.
Speaker 1: They trailed after the first quarter twenty one to fifteen,
Speaker 1: but then held Bama only nine points in the second
Speaker 1: quarter went on to win at sixty five fifty six,
Speaker 1: low scoring game. Kenny Brooks said, it was all about
Speaker 1: that defense.
Speaker 6: I thought our defense was really good second thirty, fourth quarters,
Speaker 6: and you know, it wasn't always the prettiest. I thought
Speaker 6: we were a little bit off a little bit some
Speaker 6: of the some of the balls that we normally grab
Speaker 6: and secure we were tipping. But nonetheless I thought we
Speaker 6: really came out. I thought Georgia was really good hand
Speaker 6: those situations very well. You know, hit two big three's
Speaker 6: that really gave us some separation. You know, everybody all that,
Speaker 6: you know, everybody stepped up and did something.
Speaker 1: Clara Strack had a double double from the middle fourteen
Speaker 1: and four team Georgia Aymore outstanding sixteen points, nine assists.
Speaker 1: She did have six turnovers, but played all forty minutes
Speaker 1: and as you might expect, vital in Kentucky turning defense
Speaker 1: into offense.
Speaker 7: I remember in the third quarter Tiani was, you know,
Speaker 7: when you put in a situation where you're failing, it's
Speaker 7: hard to place all a defense. And I think that
Speaker 7: she let one go when she was so down on herself,
Speaker 7: and she she said, like my bad, and we're like, no,
Speaker 7: like it's our bad because we have to be better
Speaker 7: in the gaps.
Speaker 8: We have to be better in rotation.
Speaker 7: So we know that one on one matchups there they're tough,
Speaker 7: Like you know me a good one on one defender role,
Speaker 7: they're hard to come by. So we really understand that
Speaker 7: as a team effort.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it paid off as Kentucky comes back. It's
Speaker 1: a winover a nationally ranked team and Wildcats go right
Speaker 1: back to work. It's even tougher now on the road
Speaker 1: Sunday at Oklahoma, ranked number thirteen. Right now, it's a
Speaker 1: four o'clock star. Darren Hedricks broadcast begins at three forty
Speaker 1: five with the pregame show and then the Wildcats and
Speaker 1: the Sooner. They have played four times, Kentucky winning three,
Speaker 1: but this is the first time they've played since twenty seventeen.
Speaker 1: But again, this is the first time they will play
Speaker 1: as conference rivals, and this might be the best Oklahoma
Speaker 1: team that Kentucky will have faced. Up next, a relative
Speaker 1: of a former NFL official does think the league is rigged.
Speaker 1: We'll talk about that bottom of the hour. Daryl Bird
Speaker 1: of the Cats Paws. He's written a book about Travis
Speaker 1: Perry and Lyon County Sean Woods, The Unforgettable Guard, joins
Speaker 1: us a little bit later on here on the Big
Speaker 1: Boone Sider six thirty WLAP Welcome Back coming up in
Speaker 1: just a few minutes. Daryl Bird of the Cats Paws
Speaker 1: would tell us all about his book on Travis Perry
Speaker 1: and Lion County called Lion Pride. Will also talk about
Speaker 1: the Wild Kats in the Arkansas game. Daryl was at
Speaker 1: both the Vandy and the Tennessee games, but we'll talk
Speaker 1: first about his book because he started doing the stories
Speaker 1: and reporting on and just getting to know the Lion
Speaker 1: County community all during their run to the Sweet sixteen
Speaker 1: championship last year. So now he's got a book out
Speaker 1: and I can't wait to read it. You know that
Speaker 1: the Super Bowl coming up with the Chiefs and the Eagles,
Speaker 1: and there are people out there who believe the NFL
Speaker 1: is rigged. We talked about this the other day because
Speaker 1: it just seems like things always go Kansas City's way.
Speaker 1: Dean Blandino, who is the Fox TV rules analyst now
Speaker 1: former senior vice president of Officiating for the NFL, he
Speaker 1: was on a podcast the other day and he revealed
Speaker 1: the fact that his own brother believes the league is rigged,
Speaker 1: and his brother is convinced that Blandino signed an NDA
Speaker 1: non disclosure agreement when he left the league office, stating
Speaker 1: that he can't tell anybody that it is rigged. He
Speaker 1: was talking on the Sirius X and Mad Dog Sports show.
Speaker 1: He said, we grew up in the same household. By
Speaker 1: the way, he said, I told him there's no conspiracy.
Speaker 1: There's too many variable and that's exactly what I've been
Speaker 1: saying all along. But Blendino said it would be the
Speaker 1: hardest sport to rig. He said, when you think about
Speaker 1: football with seven different officials to say, okay, I'm going
Speaker 1: to rig this game, or as he says, the game
Speaker 1: is rigged from the league office right down. The officials
Speaker 1: are just trying to get it right, he said, And
Speaker 1: again I'll reiterate, we know that Tim Donaghy, an NBA official,
Speaker 1: wasn't rigging games, but he was helping to fix games
Speaker 1: by seeing to it that teams either did or did
Speaker 1: not reach their point spread. That's where the gambling is done.
Speaker 1: That's where the money's made point spread over and under.
Speaker 1: And one basketball official can do that. Now, in a
Speaker 1: similar situation in football, if you are let's say you're
Speaker 1: the line judge and you need a team to not cover,
Speaker 1: and you have the opportunity or not to call a
Speaker 1: touchdown a touchdown, maybe you raise your hands, maybe you don't,
Speaker 1: but that doesn't mean one of your compadres won't as well.
Speaker 1: You see that all the time, more than one official
Speaker 1: signaling touchdown. It rarely, if ever, comes down to one
Speaker 1: official on a scoring play. It does come down to
Speaker 1: one official on things like holding or pass interference. But
Speaker 1: to say the league is rigged, if you want to believe,
Speaker 1: you know that that an official here or there might
Speaker 1: be doing things he shouldn't be doing, or she okay,
Speaker 1: But to say the league is rigged to seat to
Speaker 1: it that Kansas City wins is ridiculous. And it's just
Speaker 1: as ridiculous I'll go back to the time when really
Speaker 1: it's been both because Kentucky fans, like all fans, get paranoid.
Speaker 1: But there was a stretch several years ago, probably almost
Speaker 1: twenty years ago, where UK football suffered some weird losses
Speaker 1: with two many penalty calls or whatever, and I kept
Speaker 1: tearing people saying, well, the league doesn't want Kentucky to win.
Speaker 1: Roy Kramer, the commissioner, make sure Kentucky doesn't win. I
Speaker 1: heard that one more than once, and I checked it out.
Speaker 1: Roy Kramer at the time was making six hundred thousand
Speaker 1: dollars a year as the commissioner of the Southeastern Conference,
Speaker 1: and of course I had a golden parachute. He was
Speaker 1: on the tail end of his career, so I had
Speaker 1: a hard time believing that Roy Kramer would a risk
Speaker 1: prison time at his age. B give up that cushy
Speaker 1: salary and C give up that golden parachute to make
Speaker 1: sure Kentucky doesn't go to the independence ball. Come on
Speaker 1: and I remember one week in the middle of it all,
Speaker 1: Tom Leach did the math and he said, if they
Speaker 1: really want to fix games, because every time a team
Speaker 1: made a ball game, the league got money and every
Speaker 1: team in the league program in the league got a share,
Speaker 1: he said, if they want to make sure that the
Speaker 1: league makes more money, they'll fix games to make sure
Speaker 1: Kentucky gets in two enough wins to get to a
Speaker 1: ball game. And South Carolina at the same time was
Speaker 1: on the verge of getting to a ball game, which
Speaker 1: was rare at the time for South Carolina. So that's
Speaker 1: just how ridiculous it was. But I thought it was
Speaker 1: interesting that Blandino spoke out on Sirius XM. You know,
Speaker 1: and it also reminds you of you know, the fans
Speaker 1: who believe that the NCAA tournament is stacked against Kentucky,
Speaker 1: that officials at the behest of the NCAAA quote that big,
Speaker 1: mysterious monolith, that nobody understands how it works. They want
Speaker 1: to make sure Kentucky either doesn't get in or doesn't win,
Speaker 1: forgetting about the fact that when it comes to college basketball,
Speaker 1: the very thing that makes you, as a Kentucky fan
Speaker 1: proud to be a Wildcat to be a Kentucky fan.
Speaker 1: The enormity of Kentucky basketball is exactly why. If you're
Speaker 1: gonna screw around with things as the group that runs
Speaker 1: the NCAA Tournament, including the TV people, you want Kentucky
Speaker 1: in the tournament and alive as long as it's feasibly possible,
Speaker 1: because it brings eyeballs. It brings ratings. All the big
Speaker 1: name brands. Do you go back to the Final Four
Speaker 1: when George Mason and UCLA and Florida and I can't
Speaker 1: remember who the fourth one was when they were in
Speaker 1: it with tiny fan but even Florida Basketball, for all
Speaker 1: the great things Billy Donovan did, never really pulled much
Speaker 1: of an audience. The ratings for that Final Four were
Speaker 1: the worst in the history of the Final Four. It's
Speaker 1: the brand names that bring the eyeballs. North Carolina is
Speaker 1: not going to get in the tournament this year. Probably
Speaker 1: that's gonna hurt ratings because even if you're not a
Speaker 1: North Carolina fan, people tune in to watch North caare Carolina,
Speaker 1: and you better believe they tune in to watch Kentucky.
Speaker 1: Do they tune into see you hoping they might lose? Maybe,
Speaker 1: but they tune in, don't matter why that brings the eyeballs,
Speaker 1: that brings the ratings, that brings the money. Not instantly,
Speaker 1: of course, it's all applied to the following year when
Speaker 1: they go out and sell advertising. So yeah, game like, yeah,
Speaker 1: all that stuff's all about money. But remember, as I
Speaker 1: said the other day, and there is a story out
Speaker 1: there right now out of Las Vegas, that there's an
Speaker 1: investigation going on right now about unusual betting patterns surrounding
Speaker 1: the play of NBA player Terry Rozier in twenty twenty three.
Speaker 1: Unusual betting patterns. He was with the Charlotte Hornets back then,
Speaker 1: and that's part of the same probe that led to
Speaker 1: a lifetime ban of John tay Porter, who had been
Speaker 1: with the Raptors. NBA confirmed this on Thursday. The Wall
Speaker 1: Street Journal first reported it rose he's still playing, he's
Speaker 1: with the Heat, but there is an investigation because of
Speaker 1: the betting patterns. And the people out in the desert
Speaker 1: keep an eye out such things, and they police the matters.
Speaker 1: Not the FBI. They don't get they don't jump intil later,
Speaker 1: and certainly not the NCAA. Again, that was one of
Speaker 1: the dumbest things i'd ever heard the NCAA should be
Speaker 1: investigating point shaving. Please leave it to the experts. And
Speaker 1: those are the guys and gals out in Vegas. Just
Speaker 1: the thought. As we head into Super Bowl Week, the
Speaker 1: hype begins this weekend. Daryl Bird next here on six
Speaker 1: thirty Welcome back to the Big Moonsider. Joining us now
Speaker 1: is the editor of The Cat's Balls, a long time
Speaker 1: friend of the show, Darryl Bird, who covered both the
Speaker 1: road games Vandy and ut So he spent a lot
Speaker 1: of time in Tennessee over the last couple of weeks.
Speaker 1: But I want to talk for Darryl, and we have
Speaker 1: talked before about Travis Perry and Lyon County because we
Speaker 1: spoke Daryl after the Sweet Sixteen and when Travis Perry
Speaker 1: sign and all that. You've become kind of the Travis
Speaker 1: Perry expert on the UK bet and now you've got
Speaker 1: a book out there about the Lion County. I don't know,
Speaker 1: would you consider that a Cinderella story. It's a tiny school,
Speaker 1: but boy, what a great team.
Speaker 9: Yeah, what a great team. You're right, you have the
Speaker 9: ultimate Cinderella story. To think that three best friends from
Speaker 9: kindergarten on in far western Kentucky and a school with
Speaker 9: two hundred and seventy five students could grow up and
Speaker 9: win the state tournament. And yeah, definitely sendery. I had
Speaker 9: them At one point, I said, I'm I got curious.
Speaker 9: I called the ad to Lion County. I said, just
Speaker 9: for me, how many boys in the senior class?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 10: This year?
Speaker 9: Thirty seven? Wow, I about fell over.
Speaker 3: Are you kidding?
Speaker 9: Thirty seven boys?
Speaker 1: That is so cool. It's called Lion Pride. Oh yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: but it's called Lion Pride Ohio n And of course
Speaker 1: it I don't think the story starts with the state
Speaker 1: championship in March twenty third, as you said, It starts
Speaker 1: so many years prior to that, doesn't.
Speaker 9: It started in kindergarten. It's when they all started in kindergarten.
Speaker 9: All three came together officially in the second grade on
Speaker 9: some teeny tiny little travel team that was probably hilarious
Speaker 9: to see. But yeah, that's that's it follows. The story
Speaker 9: follows from their first meeting kindergarten all the way through
Speaker 9: the championship at Reparino last year. And you and I
Speaker 9: talked the last time, Yeah, and it was just pure
Speaker 9: dumb luck on my part that I needed a story
Speaker 9: for the basketball year book two years ago, so I
Speaker 9: went down there that summer to do a feature on
Speaker 9: Travis Perry for the high school section. You just broke
Speaker 9: in King Kelly's record and I wasn't there fifteen minutes,
Speaker 9: and I'm like, oh, my goodness, this is so much
Speaker 9: bigger than Travis Perry and some record. And you just
Speaker 9: the more you went around town, You're like, this place
Speaker 9: is consumed in a very good way. They are consumed
Speaker 9: with this basketball team. And ended up just following it
Speaker 9: and then going to Whalen and then here they go,
Speaker 9: as this state would have it, UK gets knocked out
Speaker 9: by Oakland in Pittsburgh and I make it back in
Speaker 9: time to cover the Final four and the championship of
Speaker 9: the Sweet sixteen, and of course after that, I was like, oh,
Speaker 9: I got to go to the celebration the next day
Speaker 9: at Eddie Well. I got to go to the high
Speaker 9: school the banquet at the end of view and ended
Speaker 9: up making four or five trips down and I said,
Speaker 9: this has to be I've always wanted to write a book,
Speaker 9: and this seemed like the perfect time to make a
Speaker 9: run at it.
Speaker 1: Really, this is your first Yes, Wow.
Speaker 9: I've written. I told somebody I've probably written enough to
Speaker 9: pull a library. Yeah, never have written a book. And
Speaker 9: it is the hardest thing you will ever matchine, It
Speaker 9: is so hard to do, and like, where do you start?
Speaker 10: How do you do it? Justice?
Speaker 9: Oh my gosh, yeah, drive you crazy, and you work
Speaker 9: on it and you've got your real job and you
Speaker 9: go back and it's like, wow, I haven't been on
Speaker 9: in the story in three weeks.
Speaker 1: I gotta yeah.
Speaker 9: Yeah, it was. It was worthy.
Speaker 1: But at least with this story, there's a built in timeline,
Speaker 1: as you said, starting with whatever year they were in
Speaker 1: second grade. And the story's so happening with Travis at
Speaker 1: UK of course, but we're not supposed to root for
Speaker 1: teams when we cover events, right, But who could blame
Speaker 1: you for root? Like hell for Lion County and a
Speaker 1: Sweet sixteen.
Speaker 9: What a story, and it has touched so many people.
Speaker 9: I've heard people who did not know Lion County existed
Speaker 9: but loved it because of the personal stories and also
Speaker 9: because how many of us out there can relate to
Speaker 9: I went to a small county school. We never had
Speaker 9: a prayer getting out of the district, in getting to
Speaker 9: the state and I mean it's like everybody just jumped
Speaker 9: on those coattails and rode along with them for the fun.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 9: I remember asking the kids that after they on the tournament,
Speaker 9: I said, you, do you have any idea how many
Speaker 9: people are celebrating with you right now? How many people
Speaker 9: went to small county schools who never got clothes, who
Speaker 9: are just rejoicing with you? And I think to a
Speaker 9: degree they did. But Ryan Perry was sitting up, their
Speaker 9: coach was sitting over. He's just got a big smile.
Speaker 4: We know, we know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, in Lion County, is it not the smallest county
Speaker 1: in the state.
Speaker 9: I don't know that.
Speaker 4: There's only eight thousands.
Speaker 9: It's very small. They couldn't they could have brought everybody
Speaker 9: out of Eddyville not filled the lower bullet breenda that
Speaker 9: night for the championship.
Speaker 1: Well, my friend Kirk Child's coach there, and that's when
Speaker 1: I first really became aware of Lion County. Went on
Speaker 1: to coach at Marshall County and Henry Clay, two of
Speaker 1: the big schools. But and now everybody knows about Lyon.
Speaker 9: County and I got it just it just fell into place.
Speaker 9: So for I mean, I remember talking to you and
Speaker 9: you you were getting talking to how I had the
Speaker 9: pleasure or the the good fortune to kind of come
Speaker 9: full circle. Went down there to do a story on
Speaker 9: Travis and ended up following it all the way through
Speaker 9: to its conclusion, just the way it worked. But the
Speaker 9: personal stories are Travis, You've got the whole dynamic of
Speaker 9: growing up playing for your dad, which has its own
Speaker 9: interesting dynamics. Jackie Reddick, the point guard who's at Florida
Speaker 9: Gulf Coast his father passed away from cancer, was a freshman,
Speaker 9: and how that whole team and community kind of wrapped
Speaker 9: around him and protected him during that. And then Brady's Shoulders,
Speaker 9: who's doing really well at Mercer. He started after his
Speaker 9: third game, I think, and I said, wait a minute,
Speaker 9: what his grandfather. There's a giant coal miner statue in Princeton,
Speaker 9: Kentucky's providence. It's Bray's grandfather. Wow, Like you've got to
Speaker 9: be kidding me. Got to dive into that whole the
Speaker 9: family dynamic theory. Worked in the Coolema for forty three
Speaker 9: years and he was at every game Lyon County played.
Speaker 9: But he got cancer. He died right before the start
Speaker 9: of the champions Law. Yeah, Yeah, that's a heartbreaker.
Speaker 1: Yeah. You know, there's so many very cool, so many
Speaker 1: peripheral stories. You know, there's an expression this stuff rights itself. Well,
Speaker 1: no it doesn't. It's a lot of work. But Darryl
Speaker 1: put into the book Lion Pride. We're talking with Darryl
Speaker 1: Bird of the Cat's Balls. And I remember when I
Speaker 1: first started hearing about Travis Perry and his stats, his numbers,
Speaker 1: and you know, and this is no disrespect, I immediately
Speaker 1: thought about Irvin's step And Irvin was the kid at
Speaker 1: Phelps who averaged fifty a game and was making national headlines.
Speaker 1: And you know it was a great shooter, a great score,
Speaker 1: not the greatest player, but he was in a situation
Speaker 1: his brother was coaching him, and honestly, that's what they
Speaker 1: needed from him in order to try to win games.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 1: And I know Lion County did too, But I'm watching
Speaker 1: Lion County in the state tournament and Travis was not
Speaker 1: as much a facilitator as he was a scorer because
Speaker 1: they needed him to score, but he did help other
Speaker 1: guys score. And we're seeing that now at Kentucky. People
Speaker 1: I think were surprised to hear Mark Pope describe him
Speaker 1: as a point guard, you know what I mean?
Speaker 9: Yes, yeah, because he didn't officially play the point at Lyon,
Speaker 9: but yes, he was heavily involved in that.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Did you think about that, Like, here's a kid
Speaker 1: playing for his dad, score all these points. Dad wants
Speaker 1: his kid to score all these points, and yet that's
Speaker 1: honestly what was best for the team, right.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 9: Before I ever went down there, you do get You've
Speaker 9: heard so many of these scores, a lot of them
Speaker 9: come out of the Eastern Kentucky Mountains. Get there fifty
Speaker 9: a game and you get down there and you realize
Speaker 9: it's just about scoring, and the team's not that good
Speaker 9: and they do what they can, but they're just never
Speaker 9: going to get very far out of the postseason. Yeah,
Speaker 9: and you get down there and it's like, oh, they're good.
Speaker 9: They're really good in a lot of a lot of
Speaker 9: different ways. These How do you endo a three D
Speaker 9: one scholarship out of a school with two hundred and
Speaker 9: eighty five.
Speaker 1: Kids and they knew how to play?
Speaker 9: It's yeah, and they have been doing it from the beginning.
Speaker 9: They traveled all over the place. And I remember talking
Speaker 9: to Ryan one boy, and he said, for us as
Speaker 9: long as they played well, we can care. It was
Speaker 9: never about chasing trophies on an a U circuit. Did
Speaker 9: we get a little better, he said, well, no matter
Speaker 9: what tournament we go to. Once they got a little older,
Speaker 9: he said, I requested the hardest pool that they had,
Speaker 9: really because I wanted they wanted to push them to
Speaker 9: get better, and didn't matter if they won one, loss
Speaker 9: or drawl, you know, just just get better because of
Speaker 9: the level of the competition. And it sure paid off,
Speaker 9: no doubt.
Speaker 1: In the synopsis of the book that's on Amazon where
Speaker 1: you can find it, by the Way Lion Pride, Yo
Speaker 1: and Pride, the coach player relationship of the Perrys is
Speaker 1: described as tricky without giving away the store, how tricky
Speaker 1: did it get?
Speaker 9: Trickiest parts were when he Travis said, when he was
Speaker 9: middle school, which is you know, that's when most kids
Speaker 9: are not head and he said, he said, when you're young,
Speaker 9: you're professor, You're trying to do your best. Things aren't
Speaker 9: going your way. You get mad, you get angry. Who
Speaker 9: are you going to take it out? You give it
Speaker 9: to your dad? He said. The problem is I was
Speaker 9: giving it to my dad during the game, and I
Speaker 9: take some stupid shot. He'd throw that advisor across the
Speaker 9: floor and I'd have it was my job. I had
Speaker 9: to walk over, pick up the visor, walk it over,
Speaker 9: hand it to him, and basically apologize to get back
Speaker 9: out there. And he said this. I thought this struck
Speaker 9: with me pretty good. He said, you know, I did
Speaker 9: that over and over and over, and finally, when I'm
Speaker 9: sitting down there at the end of the bench, I'm
Speaker 9: realizing this ain't gonna work. I clawed Ryan Perry for said,
Speaker 9: I don't care how good you are, you're not going
Speaker 9: to follow this. Go sit down there at the end
Speaker 9: and we'll just play with what we got.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 9: And he did that more than once. And Travis said,
Speaker 9: you know, by the time senior year, it just took
Speaker 9: a look. I look, I take a shot and look
Speaker 9: over the bench, and I knew by his expression, whether
Speaker 9: good or bad.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but that.
Speaker 9: Whole dynamic, he said, the hardest it said. It's in
Speaker 9: Travis told me. He said, it's so unfair in high school,
Speaker 9: no matter which team it is, if they lost the game,
Speaker 9: it's the coach's fault. It's always the coach's fault. And
Speaker 9: he said, I'm out there, I can have a say
Speaker 9: in this. So I am trying as hard as I
Speaker 9: can to make sure we don't lose A because they
Speaker 9: won't blame he said, because they won't blame my dad
Speaker 9: and B so I don't have to ride home in
Speaker 9: the car with Dad after the loss.
Speaker 1: Oh man, you know, I'm flashing back on stories you
Speaker 1: hear about guys who played for their dads, and you know,
Speaker 1: when they get home, he's still got to take out
Speaker 1: the trash, no matter how big a story of a
Speaker 1: star they are. And I remember I was interviewing Corey Edmund,
Speaker 1: who is a strength and conditioning coach at Kentucky and
Speaker 1: the father of Leah Edmund, who arguably is the best
Speaker 1: player in the history of the UK volleyball program. And
Speaker 1: you know, and I was talking to him about his
Speaker 1: daughter and I said something about her being a great athlete,
Speaker 1: and he interrupted me. She is not a great athlete,
Speaker 1: you know, And he starts talking about all the things
Speaker 1: she needed. This is before she had graduated. I thinks
Speaker 1: she needed to work on this and that I'm thinking, Man,
Speaker 1: that's got to be tough. And he she wasn't even
Speaker 1: playing for dad, but he was her strength and conditioning coach.
Speaker 1: So dads see things differently, don't they.
Speaker 9: Yeah, But it was a little different with Travis and
Speaker 9: Ryan because Ryan said if Travis didn't have a good game,
Speaker 9: he never said a word. Because Travis would go out
Speaker 9: to the garage at one o'clock in the morning shooting wow,
Speaker 9: one two o'clock after especially after a loss. He's the
Speaker 9: we all know how competitive once you get to hear
Speaker 9: some of the coolest backstories. Two things with Travis that
Speaker 9: really stuck out to me about his competitiveness. And I
Speaker 9: think Ryan said in sixth grade he took over as
Speaker 9: the middle school coach, he said, and we decided, or
Speaker 9: I decided, we're going to jump rope for conditioning, he said.
Speaker 9: And Travis could not jump rope to save his life,
Speaker 9: he said. He he tripped everybody. He could about three,
Speaker 9: any trip, get about three, any trip. Couldn't do it,
Speaker 9: he said. So they're home, he said, and I'm he said,
Speaker 9: I'm like, what is that three o'clock in the morning,
Speaker 9: Travis is out in the driveway jumping rope.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 10: He said.
Speaker 9: By the next day at school, he could out jump,
Speaker 9: He could jump rope better than.
Speaker 10: Anybody on the team.
Speaker 9: By the morning that's how competitive. He said, he just
Speaker 9: could not tolerate not being able to jump rope. That
Speaker 9: that's what he did. Yeah, isn't that amazing? Yet, there's
Speaker 9: all kinds there's all kinds of stories like that.
Speaker 1: We'll take a break. We're talking with Darryl Bird of
Speaker 1: the Cats Paws. He has written a book about not
Speaker 1: just Travis Perry, what about Lion County's run to the
Speaker 1: Sweet sixteen championship called Lion Pride, and Darrel's been busy
Speaker 1: covering the Cats. We'll talk about that on the other
Speaker 1: side of the break. Here, Welcome back to the Big
Speaker 1: Moonsider coming up tomorrow. It's UK Arkansas. But I wanted
Speaker 1: to talk to Darryl about both the Vandy and the
Speaker 1: Knoxville trips you made. I've made many of them, as
Speaker 1: you know, so have you through your career. The Vandy
Speaker 1: game was just I felt like a bit of an
Speaker 1: aberration for this Kentucky team. But I am still amazed
Speaker 1: how they got out of Knoxville with a win. Tennessee
Speaker 1: I think helped by continually jacking up threes. It's just
Speaker 1: the way Pope cobbled that game plan together. I thought
Speaker 1: was maybe the most impressive win of the year, no doubt.
Speaker 9: I was stunned. I went down there where fully believing they're.
Speaker 10: Losing this game.
Speaker 9: Yeah, you just on the very surface, you cannot take
Speaker 9: away Lamont Butler. When you have to play against the Kayziegler,
Speaker 9: he's gonna have he's gonna have somebody like we were
Speaker 9: laughing for the game. He's gonna have a double double
Speaker 9: twenty assistant, twenty steels. He's just he's gonna go nuts
Speaker 9: on you if you don't have Lamant to slow him down.
Speaker 9: And you know, right at the very beginning, oh smart move, Mark,
Speaker 9: he put Jackson Robinson on him, put a tall player
Speaker 9: on him to make it difficult. Yeah, that there's no
Speaker 9: you take him away. You take Afo Andrew Car away.
Speaker 9: I mean I wrote about a little bit. You started
Speaker 9: with nine veterans, now you got six, got six veterans
Speaker 9: and three freshmen. And you went down there into Tennessee
Speaker 9: and everybody was here around here was like, oh my gosh,
Speaker 9: you case lost to in a row. So had Tennessee.
Speaker 9: Tennessee desperately needed to win that game.
Speaker 5: Home.
Speaker 9: You said you're going home. They don't have Butler and
Speaker 9: car Yeah, this could be a route and they just
Speaker 9: I wasn't. I was impressed and as much impressed late
Speaker 9: in the game because they kept building out to like
Speaker 9: a seven eight point lead in Tennessee would cut it back.
Speaker 9: They get out Tennessee and there was one point where
Speaker 9: they got it down to three. It was deafening in there.
Speaker 9: It was, I know, rupfereno big Nation loves to you know,
Speaker 9: look at us inside ruffle kind of loud it is.
Speaker 9: It was that loud you couldn't hear yourself thinking they're
Speaker 9: trying to come up full court press being put on.
Speaker 9: They're trying to hang on her dear life at the end,
Speaker 9: and they handled it. I was I was stunned and
Speaker 9: pressed and stunned.
Speaker 1: At that point when it was at its loudest, didn't
Speaker 1: somebody throw in a three.
Speaker 10: Something like that, something like that.
Speaker 9: They responded, Yeah, I know, Trent Noah's was big, and
Speaker 9: Kobe Brays all Kobe's were, oh, yeah, we're huge.
Speaker 10: But yeah.
Speaker 9: Mark's strategy was just he was dead on put Jackson
Speaker 9: and Jackson was I don't know if he showed on
Speaker 9: TV whole about the last ten minutes. He was cramping
Speaker 9: every time there was a break. He's stretching as much
Speaker 9: as he can. He was just wearing out, trying to
Speaker 9: hang with They.
Speaker 1: Showed that when he was about to shoot free throws. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they didn't mention, but they said, yeah, he's he's trying to,
Speaker 1: you know, stay a whole.
Speaker 9: And he was absolutely and that and there was no
Speaker 9: talk of like I look up and like Kennessey's taking
Speaker 9: forty three.
Speaker 11: It's what they done.
Speaker 9: Yeah, and I heard Coach Pope and Rick Barnes both
Speaker 9: say the same thing. Mark basically said, yeah, but we
Speaker 9: we purposely wanted some of those guys taking it. Basically
Speaker 9: we wanted those guys. And Rick Barnes heard on his
Speaker 9: radio show when I walk back out, he's talking about, Yeah,
Speaker 9: we basically we had the wrong guys taking the shots
Speaker 9: and they were there. So there was a smart move
Speaker 9: on Mark. And then two let Amari bring the ball
Speaker 9: up again?
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, that.
Speaker 9: Was the Yeah, you don't have Laman who's going to
Speaker 9: bring it up for you. Let's Tennessee's Center see if
Speaker 9: he can flow down the prail.
Speaker 1: Did that remind you at all because it should in
Speaker 1: me if Sam Bowie bringing the ball up the floor
Speaker 1: back in the day, Yeah.
Speaker 9: I hadn't thought about it, but yeah I did, now
Speaker 9: that you mention it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and especially against Georgetown in the final four and
Speaker 1: eighty four, because I remember thinking, I don't think Kentucky
Speaker 1: can be Georgetown, because I don't know that they can
Speaker 1: handle the pressure of the guards bringing the ball off
Speaker 1: the floor. I was there in Seattle. You might have been,
Speaker 1: and the first time Bowie brought the ball up the floor,
Speaker 1: I said, of course, Sam brings the ball up and
Speaker 1: there's you in waiting on him at half cor lighting. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'll cover you right here, you know, And the same
Speaker 1: thing happens in Knoxville, didn't it.
Speaker 9: Yeah, it was a very very smart move.
Speaker 10: Yeah, very unoppressed.
Speaker 9: They they only had nine players that they got contribution.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I had to have it.
Speaker 9: And yeah, that was that was impressive. And because I
Speaker 9: freely admit I did not see it, coming out with
Speaker 9: trouble well and bringing circle three game, losing Street, coming
Speaker 9: to Arkan flo.
Speaker 1: And bringing in full circle. Uh, Travis played well, and
Speaker 1: so did Trent know it may be more so than
Speaker 1: Travis did.
Speaker 10: Trent played.
Speaker 9: Yeah, Trent seems to be when you're watching him on
Speaker 9: the court, Trent seems to be the most comfortable. Yeah,
Speaker 9: and his skin out there and I did ask market
Speaker 9: won on after the Tennessee game. So basically, you know,
Speaker 9: what's the deal. Trent hadn't played since New Year's Eve
Speaker 9: and now he's played. Of course, part of Andrew Carlough.
Speaker 9: You don't see trading at six to eleven for a
Speaker 9: six six as being that's why he's in the game now.
Speaker 9: But he did get his little you know, well, next
Speaker 9: man up right, and he played, He did all right,
Speaker 9: evand and he did really well. Knoxville played very well.
Speaker 1: Well you saw him play in the Sweet sixteen or
Speaker 1: you're there covering Travis Perry but you couldn't help. But
Speaker 1: notice obviously Trent Noah and you know Trent was a
Speaker 1: physical force.
Speaker 9: They are they are very different players, Travis and Trent.
Speaker 9: You know they've known each other forever the roommates the UK.
Speaker 9: Now they are different players, and that's you know, you think,
Speaker 9: why is Trent Noah going in for Andrew Carr's absence
Speaker 9: Because he's sixty six and he can rebound and he's physical, yes,
Speaker 9: but he can't fill it up. He went off in
Speaker 9: the Sweet sixteen, that miracle come back, and then they
Speaker 9: had and scored. I think seventeen to the last twenty
Speaker 9: five the force Overton right. He can go all from
Speaker 9: three just as easily as rights Travis kan He is
Speaker 9: Darryl bird Sit here and think, Wow, Arkansas didn't Bird
Speaker 9: Calbury didn't even with in his direction of a scholarship.
Speaker 8: Wo.
Speaker 1: No, he is Darryl Birdy is the author of Lion Pride.
Speaker 1: You can find it on Amazon and in other bookstores.
Speaker 1: We buy your favorite books, Add that to your library
Speaker 1: and learn about Travis Perry and Lion County High School's
Speaker 1: run to the Sweet sixteenth title. Thank you, sir. We
Speaker 1: will see you at the ball game.
Speaker 9: That's gonna be fun.
Speaker 1: Up next hour number two, when we will relive the
Speaker 1: highlights of Kentucky Tennessee. But first we'll talk but unforgetable
Speaker 1: guard Sean Woods. We usually speak with him on Wednesdays,
Speaker 1: but we were bumped by the coaches show lineup, So
Speaker 1: we will chat with Sean about what he saw down
Speaker 1: in Knoxville, what he expects coming up when John Keller
Speaker 1: Perry steps into Upperna tomorrow night. That's all I have
Speaker 1: you on a big one side or six point thirty wlapager.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Big Blue Insider and joining us.
Speaker 1: Now it's a Friday, but we usually talked to Sean
Speaker 1: Woods on Wednesday the Unforgettable Guard, But of course we
Speaker 1: were bumped by the Coaches Show. So we will talk
Speaker 1: with Sean about that big win over Tennessee. And there's
Speaker 1: a game tomorrow somebody's coming back to town. But Sean,
Speaker 1: let me start with that game. And you and I
Speaker 1: always talk about games through the eyes the prism of
Speaker 1: the point guard, and you, of course were one on
Speaker 1: the nation's best at Kentucky. Here's a game, Sean, we're
Speaker 1: going into this one. They didn't have one. Basically, they
Speaker 1: didn't have any experience. They had Travis Perry, and there
Speaker 1: were times when Amari Williams is bringing a ball up
Speaker 1: the floor, Jackson Robinson's playing the point when that game
Speaker 1: was unfolding. Were you sitting there amazed given the fact
Speaker 1: that it's all you've played there, and they've got a
Speaker 1: terrific point guard of their own, Tennessee does, and Kentucky's
Speaker 1: without their number one floor general and number two floora general.
Speaker 1: What was your reaction?
Speaker 4: Well, first of all, I thought that was a great
Speaker 4: strategy of relieving pressure, letting the Mary Williams bring the
Speaker 4: basketball up the court back in the day when I left,
Speaker 4: when Travis was having problems getting the ball up the
Speaker 4: court because he's playing against bigger guard. Yeah, Coach Patino
Speaker 4: would do that. He would have somebody else bring the
Speaker 4: ball up to relieve the pressure from Travis on Travis,
Speaker 4: and then once you got into the half court, now
Speaker 4: you ran your stuff. So you know, the great, great
Speaker 4: move by Mark Pope of doing that to relieve some
Speaker 4: of the pressure when he didn't have a point guard
Speaker 4: per se. But man, you know, just the relentlessness and
Speaker 4: the fortitude of these guys knowing that they were, you know,
Speaker 4: behind the eight ball a little bit from a personnel standpoint,
Speaker 4: And to go into Tennessee, the number one team in
Speaker 4: the conference or another top team in the conference, one
Speaker 4: of the top teams, and get a win on the road,
Speaker 4: that's kudos for Coach Pope, his staff and the Wildcats. Man,
Speaker 4: Now that that was probably to me, that may have
Speaker 4: been the most impressive win under the circumstances that they've
Speaker 4: had all season.
Speaker 1: Wow. Well again, you've played down there, and I was
Speaker 1: there in Knoxville when you guys played. But I'm having
Speaker 1: a hard time remembering while back, but I know that
Speaker 1: it wasn't people hanging from the rafters to see the
Speaker 1: balls play you got or was it? What do you
Speaker 1: remember about going into Knoxville, Well, I'll tell you what.
Speaker 4: It has always been a hard place to play.
Speaker 10: You know.
Speaker 4: It was never not packed for sure, and you know,
Speaker 4: but we would have our our chef fans there also,
Speaker 4: but it was always a hard place to play. I mean,
Speaker 4: we were playing against one of the most prolific scorers
Speaker 4: in college basketball at the time in Allen Houston.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So, and they got us real good our senior year,
Speaker 4: and then we were able to get them back, you know,
Speaker 4: and they came back in for Senior Night. Unfortunately I
Speaker 4: didn't get to finish the gay yet, but uh, we
Speaker 4: were back. But they were good, you know. And you know,
Speaker 4: back then, just like now, they're saying the SEC's better
Speaker 4: than ever. But every team in the SEC had first
Speaker 4: round draft picks and there was never a tough easy out.
Speaker 4: I don't care if you played Vanderbilt. At Vanderbilt, you know,
Speaker 4: they were Todd millhilland Bruce Anglin. I mean, those guys
Speaker 4: were just tough to beat. At Vanderbilt, so the league
Speaker 4: has never been a slouch. I don't know why people
Speaker 4: saying that it's better than ever. I just think that
Speaker 4: it's just as good. And it's because these one and
Speaker 4: Dons and things like that, you kind of put a
Speaker 4: more of a stamp on it. But you know, SEC
Speaker 4: basketball has always been great. You know, back then we
Speaker 4: were getting five to six. They're saying it's gonna be
Speaker 4: teen because of Vanderbilt, old Mississippi State, but still old
Speaker 4: miss and Mississippi State was still a hard, a tough out,
Speaker 4: especially on the roads.
Speaker 1: Yea, if there were I just think top to bottom sean,
Speaker 1: it's never been as tough. I think, I think the
Speaker 1: top half of the league back when you played, especially
Speaker 1: on the road, yeah, brutal. But now, man, everybody's pouring
Speaker 1: money into scheduling, into facility, into coaching staffs, and surely
Speaker 1: you can appreciate that now you've never you know, broken
Speaker 1: the bank, and some of the coaching staffs you've made.
Speaker 1: But some of these coaches, man, they're entrepreneurs now and
Speaker 1: their assistant are getting crazy money. It's never been like that.
Speaker 4: No, you're right about that, you know, And uh, it's
Speaker 4: glorified now. Oh yeah, you know, there's more promotion as
Speaker 4: far as basketball is concerning the SEC. And that's what's
Speaker 4: making it different too. You know, look at old missed facilities.
Speaker 4: Now they were the worst in the conference and now
Speaker 4: they're pretty good. They're pumping money into it and you
Speaker 4: see the results. Look at Mississippi State, No, and they're
Speaker 4: also going to going out and getting great coaches, uh
Speaker 4: with with with a lot of experience, especially from the
Speaker 4: recruiting situation.
Speaker 10: From the recruiting situation.
Speaker 1: By the way, I just pulled up the box score
Speaker 1: from that game with Tennessee to win. They got you
Speaker 1: pretty good down in Knoxville. Allen Houston got thirty six.
Speaker 1: They put Tennessee put five guys in double figures, scored
Speaker 1: eighty eight points on Senior Night, But you guys scored
Speaker 1: ninety nine. Jamal had thirty. Sean Woods played twelve minutes, folks,
Speaker 1: and nothing on the stat line but zeros except Sean
Speaker 1: You had six assists in twelve minutes. How the hell
Speaker 1: did you do that?
Speaker 10: Well?
Speaker 4: My goal was Coach Ertino, and that I got together
Speaker 4: because I wanted to break the single game assist record. Ah,
Speaker 4: and that's all I was doing. I didn't even look
Speaker 4: at the basket. I was just passing that thing and
Speaker 4: I was on my way too. Yep, And unfortunately Jay
Speaker 4: Price and I got into a little little tango and
Speaker 4: both of us got ejected.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, he only paid played eighteen minutes. He didn't
Speaker 1: score so anyhow, But back to the matter at hand,
Speaker 1: you had sec basketball tough then. So they go into
Speaker 1: Knoxville and Tennessee. I guess falling by in Kentucky was
Speaker 1: hot hitting three pointers. Were you surprised at Rick Barnes
Speaker 1: didn't do anything that? I mean, there were four they
Speaker 1: launched forty five threes, and it killed him. I know
Speaker 1: they all think a good shooter knows the next one's
Speaker 1: going in. But that's what really allowed Kentucky to ease
Speaker 1: away and win that game.
Speaker 4: I really think too. Also from that point guard, even
Speaker 4: though he came back, I don't think he was He
Speaker 4: was one hundred percent and he's the guy who he's
Speaker 4: the straw who stirs their coffee. He stopped penetrating, you know,
Speaker 4: he started selling for jump shots because he was scared
Speaker 4: to stop on that leg like he normally does, going
Speaker 4: up strong and finishing. So I thought that was a
Speaker 4: major key in the game.
Speaker 1: Off of That's a good point, and eventually Zigler filed out.
Speaker 1: He did have six assists, but only thirteen points five
Speaker 1: of eighteen shooting in thirty five minutes and just had
Speaker 1: the one throat, just had the one turnover me. That's
Speaker 1: a great point. He was playing on a damaged leg,
Speaker 1: one that he was probably favoring anyway, having dealt with
Speaker 1: a major knee injury before. So it all comes back
Speaker 1: to the point guards, doesn't it.
Speaker 4: That's right, and you know they didn't have one. I mean,
Speaker 4: he was out there, but he wasn't himself, and you
Speaker 4: know that's what made them settle. And I can see
Speaker 4: it on Coach Barrs's face. He had no penetration to
Speaker 4: bad never really infiltrated the paint. And when you don't
Speaker 4: get paint touches, you know, nine times out of ten
Speaker 4: your field goals is not gonna be very good.
Speaker 1: Kentucky, not just without Butler and Kirk criesa once again,
Speaker 1: but without Andrew Carr And yeah, I knew that they
Speaker 1: played him, but after ninety seconds he was done. I
Speaker 1: really thought that as much as anything would keep Kentucky
Speaker 1: from winning. But somehow, some way, I guess Brandon Garrison
Speaker 1: had some decent minutes, not statistically, but Almanor came through.
Speaker 1: Colin Chandler played well the freshman. Everything came together and
Speaker 1: Trent and Noah. It was pretty impressive.
Speaker 4: Like I said before, it was probably one of the
Speaker 4: most impressive wins that they've had all year, considering the
Speaker 4: circumstances that they were under. As far as Angel.
Speaker 1: Was concerned, Yeah, well, I'll tell you what. It sets
Speaker 1: things up interesting an interesting way because for one thing,
Speaker 1: Kentucky fans, I think figured on a win at Vandy,
Speaker 1: figured on the loss at Tennessee. They flipped the script.
Speaker 1: But now they go into Saturday's game with Arkansas. We'll
Speaker 1: talk about that on the other side of the break
Speaker 1: with Shawn Wood's The Unforgettable Guard. Here on six point
Speaker 1: thirty WLAP. Welcome back to the Big Blue Insider. We're
Speaker 1: talking with the Unforgettable Guard, Shawn Woods. As Jersey hangs
Speaker 1: in the rafters of rup Sean, You've been a head
Speaker 1: coach at a number of places. I wonder at the
Speaker 1: level where you were coaching, did you ever hear Booze
Speaker 1: rain down on you when you were introducing an arena? Oh?
Speaker 4: No, doubt about it. I mean the schools I was that,
Speaker 4: you know, Southern and Gramley one of the biggest rivalries
Speaker 4: and all the college sports. Yeah, you know you got
Speaker 4: that one. You know, you go to Tech the South
Speaker 4: and plus everywhere I've been we were the top one
Speaker 4: of the top teams in the league.
Speaker 10: So you know, it was always.
Speaker 4: A big to do and and uh when our teams
Speaker 4: came into somebody else's place. So yeah, that's that's that's
Speaker 4: that's yeah, I'm used to that.
Speaker 1: I'm so do you think John Caliperrys, this is going
Speaker 1: to be a different brand of booing though, isn't it.
Speaker 4: Listen, it's not what it's the way he left is
Speaker 4: how I'm looking at this more so than you know.
Speaker 4: We are at Kentucky and we got to appreciate this
Speaker 4: man won a national championship for us. You know, he's
Speaker 4: he's made history for us. He's done probably one of
Speaker 4: the most miraculous jobs, uh, in all of college basketball
Speaker 4: as far as being a college basketball coach for us.
Speaker 4: While he was here, he became a Hall of Fame
Speaker 4: inductee while he was our coach. You know, he's won
Speaker 4: a national championship as our coach. He's one of the
Speaker 4: first to get a lifetime contract, which I don't understand,
Speaker 4: but as our coach, and he set the standard as
Speaker 4: far as getting the best. I mean, we've always been
Speaker 4: known to getting the top players in the country McDonald
Speaker 4: all Americans, but he took it to another level. He
Speaker 4: he modernized Kentucky basketball to what it is today. And
Speaker 4: we got to be thankful for that, you know what
Speaker 4: I mean. Now how he left, you know, the last
Speaker 4: few seasons. That's the only thing that that's the one
Speaker 4: of the biggest knocks has been being a coach anywhere
Speaker 4: is staying too long, you know, and and sooner or
Speaker 4: later people forget, you know, the things that you did.
Speaker 4: And first of all, you make them spoil. You get
Speaker 4: them spoiled. And then when they're not getting that, you know,
Speaker 4: they turned on you a little bit. And you know
Speaker 4: that's unfortunate in our profession, but as part of our profession.
Speaker 4: But man, you can't knot you know what John cali
Speaker 4: Perry did because he you know, during his time, we
Speaker 4: were still one most relevant college basketball program in America.
Speaker 1: You played on at a time when the Kentucky Arkansas
Speaker 1: Series was about to become the really cool rivalry in
Speaker 1: the SEC, if not the country with Nolan Richardson, I
Speaker 1: don't consider Arkansas a rival right now. Yes, it's a
Speaker 1: conference rival, but it's not like it used to be.
Speaker 1: And people, well he went to our archs Ruight, No
Speaker 1: he did not. He did go within the league, that's true.
Speaker 1: But I mean, do you consider Arkansas that way? I
Speaker 1: still think Louisville, Tennessee And people like to say.
Speaker 4: Dude, Louisville, right, Costatino went to Louisville. Okay, So now
Speaker 4: John Caliperry goes to Arkansas. Well, it's not about going
Speaker 4: to Arkansas. It's John Caliperry, right, So we're going to
Speaker 4: be in rival with John Caliperry more so than being
Speaker 4: in a rival with the institution of the University of Arkansas.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's how this thing is gonna work planning out.
Speaker 4: It's not about you know, history and this and that.
Speaker 4: It's about and it's so new that it's burning hot,
Speaker 4: it's flaming and because of who it is as a coach.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're right. How surprised are you assuming you are
Speaker 1: that Arkansas has struggled the way it has given the
Speaker 1: recruits he took there given the kids from Kentucky you
Speaker 1: transferred there starting with a point guard DJ Wagner. But
Speaker 1: Big Z and boy du Sierro looks incredible this year.
Speaker 1: But they have been probably the biggest surprise in a
Speaker 1: disappointing way in the sec.
Speaker 4: I'm I'm I'm surprised, but I'm not surprised. I don't
Speaker 4: think his team's very good. I'm gonna be honest with you.
Speaker 4: From a talent standpoint, I don't think Z is the answer.
Speaker 4: You know, for his size, he doesn't rebound to the
Speaker 4: find like he needs to. I think he gives up
Speaker 4: on a lot of plays. He's not a guy that
Speaker 4: you make him the main stay and expect to have
Speaker 4: miraculous results. So from that standpoint, I am not surprised,
Speaker 4: you know, I just think from a personnel standpoint, he's
Speaker 4: not big enough inside, I don't think he can compete
Speaker 4: on the glass like he would like. And you know
Speaker 4: he had he was. He's really depending on a freshman
Speaker 4: point guard again, and that wasn't getting him too far.
Speaker 4: And unfortunately Boogiey Flans hurt. But when he lost that kid,
Speaker 4: you know, it may have walked him up up a
Speaker 4: little bit because they won right after that. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 4: let's let's not get it twisted now, John Caliperri can coach.
Speaker 4: I mean, you don't become a Hall of Famer now.
Speaker 4: I just think he kind of lost the sizzle a
Speaker 4: little bit. I think that, you know, while his last
Speaker 4: few years here, you know, it wasn't about coaching, I
Speaker 4: think he got away from what got him here and
Speaker 4: what got him to the success that he's had. And
Speaker 4: you know, sometimes people get humbled and you know, like
Speaker 4: I said before, this this things, you know, it's different,
Speaker 4: it's evolving, and it's a new way to do with things.
Speaker 4: And I think right now, you know, he's trying to
Speaker 4: play catch up now and trying to figure out how
Speaker 4: he can, you know, get it back and get that
Speaker 4: mojo back that he had years ago.
Speaker 1: I think people forget that the first of all. They
Speaker 1: forget some people forget the glory years he had here,
Speaker 1: his first six years minus see of course, you know
Speaker 1: Neurlans Noel, that was a difficult injury and they'd never recovered.
Speaker 1: But his best team, Sean and you know this as
Speaker 1: a you're probably your best teams were combinations of that
Speaker 1: young talent and veterans. Yeah, and you think about the
Speaker 1: Harrison Twins came back that made that twenty fifteen team
Speaker 1: so powerful. His first couple teams at Kentucky, that first
Speaker 1: team he had, which I still think was his best
Speaker 1: uh at Patrick Patterson and a couple other Vets along
Speaker 1: with Wall and Cousins and Bledsoe, And I felt like
Speaker 1: he kind of got away from that for one reason
Speaker 1: or another. Do you remember it that way?
Speaker 4: Well, I wasn't around as much, you know what I'm saying,
Speaker 4: But I can just tell. But you know, if every
Speaker 4: team is different, no matter the personnel and how talented
Speaker 4: you are, and you're not gonna win a national championship
Speaker 4: every year, but he was in the mix every year,
Speaker 4: and that's all you can ask for. And then you
Speaker 4: got to have a little luck in the NCAA tournment
Speaker 4: here and there. And he will always put himself in
Speaker 4: a position where he had a chance. Except for the
Speaker 4: last few years, I thought recruiting went down. I thought
Speaker 4: he settled for some guys that wasn't, you know, capable
Speaker 4: of getting a job done. And I think that's where
Speaker 4: it left. You know, Then he lost some key staff members,
Speaker 4: you know, and all that stuff plays the part and
Speaker 4: right now, I think he's just searching. And you know,
Speaker 4: when you have bad seasons as a coach, you know
Speaker 4: you're only as good as your assistant, and you need
Speaker 4: great assistance. I don't care who how good you are.
Speaker 4: And sometimes that happens. You know what I'm saying, You
Speaker 4: ain't you don't have that same support. You know, you
Speaker 4: don't have that same backing. And I think that that
Speaker 4: happened with coach Bettino too, his latter years at Louisville,
Speaker 4: not having guys that he could trust you, and you
Speaker 4: see what happens, Things fall through the crack.
Speaker 1: But you know, I think it's interesting you say that
Speaker 1: because I'm sure you heard well, maybe you have or
Speaker 1: not again you've you were away and came back, But
Speaker 1: I kept carrying that Cali Perry who doesn't listen to
Speaker 1: his assistance. Have you ever heard that?
Speaker 4: I've heard that a lot. I've heard that a whole bunch.
Speaker 4: And sometimes, you know, like I tell people all the time,
Speaker 4: John Caliperry is human, right, And sometimes you know, just
Speaker 4: because he's a coach that he tries to tell players
Speaker 4: to not dwell in your success. I think he dwelled
Speaker 4: in his success.
Speaker 1: Huh, interesting. Yeah, you're right, do as I say, not
Speaker 1: as I do. That means a hot sometimes got a
Speaker 1: few minutes left with Sean Woods, the unforgettable guard Caliperry
Speaker 1: coming to town with Arkansas tomorrow night, a bug all else,
Speaker 1: Kentucky needs to obviously win this game Sean and protect
Speaker 1: the home court from here on, right, Yeah, they.
Speaker 4: Have to in order to stay, you know, have a
Speaker 4: chance to stay at top of the league. You got
Speaker 4: to win all your games at home because you got
Speaker 4: some a few tough ones on the road that's coming up.
Speaker 4: So you got to make sure that you take care
Speaker 4: of business and rut.
Speaker 1: Yeah, as I let you go. I went and looked
Speaker 1: up the roster of that twenty fifteen team that was
Speaker 1: nearly perfect. Yeah, they had Karl Anthony Towns, they had
Speaker 1: Booker on the bench, they had Uless Tree Lyles. But
Speaker 1: you know, Dacary Johnson was a sophomore, Marcus Lee sophomore.
Speaker 1: Who else was on that team? The Harrison Twins, And
Speaker 1: in this day and age, those are veterans.
Speaker 10: Right, no doubt about it.
Speaker 1: And then when you mix it all together with a freshman,
Speaker 1: that was a team that could have and maybe should
Speaker 1: have made history. So yeah, it takes a mix now,
Speaker 1: not just the one and done. But that's easier said
Speaker 1: than done in this day and age, isn't it.
Speaker 4: You are exactly right, I mean, and look at the
Speaker 4: years from twenty fifteen on the teams that won the
Speaker 4: national championship. Yep, yep, you know, look at Virginia that
Speaker 4: that that's the prime example of not having a bunch
Speaker 4: of two roh guys, just had some a mixture of
Speaker 4: veterans and players that had gone through the you know,
Speaker 4: the system, and by the time they got this senior year,
Speaker 4: they were really good.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, well, I mean Villanova, the teams and national
Speaker 1: titlers for Nova exactly were exactly were a good mix
Speaker 1: and it's all that balancing act. Now, Sean Woods, the
Speaker 1: Unforgettable Guard, joins us every week. His jersey hangs in
Speaker 1: the rafters. Are up, coach, Thanks so much, and enjoy your.
Speaker 10: Weekend, okay, Dick, you too, buddy.
Speaker 1: And up next we relive the highlights of Kentucky, Tennessee
Speaker 1: as we head into the weekend here on six thirty WLAP.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Big Moon Cider. So it's Kentucky
Speaker 1: Arkansas tomorrow night. We all know that Wildcats coming off
Speaker 1: a huge win down in Knoxville short handed. But boy
Speaker 1: did the Wildcats hit their shots, especially when they needed
Speaker 1: to most including free throws. Not great at the free
Speaker 1: throw line, but Oway nailed a couple with the game
Speaker 1: on the line literally and Kentucky escapes Knoxville with yet
Speaker 1: another win. So I thought going into the weekend, we
Speaker 1: would relive the highlights from the UK Radio network as
Speaker 1: Tom Leach and Jack Gibbons called the action, the Cats
Speaker 1: and the Balls. Kentucky winning for a third straight year
Speaker 1: down in Knoxville.
Speaker 3: Down the right side, puts it between his legs, turns
Speaker 3: his back to Ziegler, gets Ray up open, three ball
Speaker 3: in the air.
Speaker 8: It's good.
Speaker 3: Pass to the top to Williams, gives it to Holland
Speaker 3: or a right back to Williams, over to Robinson, less side,
Speaker 3: three god two threes for Kentucky. Robinson drives it up
Speaker 3: the right side, gets it to the trailer Williams. Robinson
Speaker 3: gets it back, it curls into the circle, steps back.
Speaker 3: He made two of them already up deep on the
Speaker 3: right side. Williams dribbles over to the left, goes down
Speaker 3: the lane, hooks it out to the right corner. Almon
Speaker 3: Or wide open.
Speaker 12: Yes, well, that is excellently executed.
Speaker 11: Our fence.
Speaker 3: It's between his legs, goes to his right down the
Speaker 3: lane with a runner off the glass. It's good boy,
Speaker 3: just beats the clock defense set.
Speaker 8: Williams fires to Robinson left wing. Three in the air.
Speaker 10: Good.
Speaker 11: Finally found a way to get open again.
Speaker 8: Baseline fires a diagonal pass to the left wing.
Speaker 3: Almonor's three is good again. Penetration and three no rebounded
Speaker 3: by Robinson. Faith slides right eighteen foot or gone across
Speaker 3: the Brea. Brandon feeds it over the right corner. Almon
Speaker 3: Or open three, money boy, They keep leaving them open
Speaker 3: twenty two Kentucky by four.
Speaker 8: Almanor fees it down.
Speaker 3: Lower the pick and rolling a dunk by Garrison off
Speaker 3: the roll.
Speaker 8: When they get it count to Garrison.
Speaker 3: Brea goes back door, makes the catch and dunkson coming
Speaker 3: in All right, Baseline and here's almon Or at the top.
Speaker 3: Gives it to Braya. Raya penetrates up with a fifteen
Speaker 3: foot a good out a way by tipping it and
Speaker 3: getting the rebound cross court pass intercepted by oh Way,
Speaker 3: drives and dunks it for the lead a huge were
Speaker 3: passed to oh way, oh wait, driving baseline left, cut off, bounce,
Speaker 3: pass over to Williams out to almon Or straight away
Speaker 3: three ball money or Hansley alman Or heaving forward, A
Speaker 3: couple of crossovers slides to his left, get a shoot
Speaker 3: a contested three and it bounces in about six to
Speaker 3: eleven akpara pray, A couple of crossovers goes by a
Speaker 3: para gets in deep rap around, feed to Williams. Thanks,
Speaker 3: happing in just ahead of the shot clock buzzer. Robinson
Speaker 3: over to Noah, floats at to Williams five to shoot him.
Speaker 3: Williams backing down to Williams turns jump hook gun nice
Speaker 3: picking off the left wing goes through the lane of
Speaker 3: all stock loose and Kentucky comes out with it and
Speaker 3: Noah may have knocked it loose. Breyer scoops it up
Speaker 3: over to Robinson, open left, winning for three.
Speaker 13: Got it.
Speaker 12: I just love how cool, calm and collected Kentucky has
Speaker 12: been on offense.
Speaker 3: Dan's Madison drills it all the way to the right corner,
Speaker 3: shut his back to Zigler, fall away fifteen foot are
Speaker 3: good Jackson Robinson with sixteen not left Garrison being manhandled
Speaker 3: using his arm. Here's Noah straight away.
Speaker 8: Three Trent, yes, Trent, don't add away. Young fella jumps
Speaker 8: up to Perry. Perry he three right side.
Speaker 3: Rentals out no good, oh Way rebounds follows. God Robins said,
Speaker 3: taking the handoff down the lane, puts it up, No
Speaker 3: tap in by Williams.
Speaker 8: But oh Way throws it to Brian has skipped off.
Speaker 3: His hands would have picked up by no Honey drives
Speaker 3: in stores hands up, heads up, right out of his hands.
Speaker 8: He's got it back.
Speaker 3: He blows by Milicic goes in and dunks it in
Speaker 3: and hits the deck hard.
Speaker 11: He jumps right back.
Speaker 3: Sixty eight sixty three Kentucky Williams drives it left, hands
Speaker 3: it to Breya long three.
Speaker 11: That's the way to get it back. That's the way
Speaker 11: to get it back right now.
Speaker 3: Two of five tonight, seventy seven percent on the season
Speaker 3: coming in.
Speaker 8: It's good, little body English there lean across.
Speaker 11: Pretty simple. Gotta make.
Speaker 8: That he does. We hear a little gold, big blue
Speaker 8: let that.
Speaker 3: Wow, it's getting louder too, God Sansley almond Or waving his.
Speaker 8: Arms for more.
Speaker 11: Just give me one, baby, Just give me one, two.
Speaker 3: Shots away, one dribble. It's in the air, and it's
Speaker 3: good God, it's in the air, beauty.
Speaker 12: You gotta put a little pressure in the back court.
Speaker 12: Make him use some time off the clock. You don't
Speaker 12: want to let.
Speaker 8: Him throw it long. That's what Kentucky's doing.
Speaker 11: You gotta make him use up some time.
Speaker 8: Get into the bar. Back to Ziegler.
Speaker 3: Ball's knock loose, He picks it up, shoots the three
Speaker 3: off right wing.
Speaker 8: It's no good.
Speaker 3: Williams Graham's another rebound, throws it into front court and
Speaker 3: the Wildcats get a win in Knoxville for the third year.
Speaker 1: In a row.
Speaker 3: It hadn't happened since two thousand and six. They did
Speaker 3: it tonight, and they did it shorthanded good and that's gracious.
Speaker 1: Jack Gibbons and Tom Leach on the UK Sports Network,
Speaker 1: and I've said it many many times. Two things. Number One,
Speaker 1: Jack Gibbons loves to see the Wildcats beat Tennessee. That
Speaker 1: was the art rival when he grew up. That's the
Speaker 1: art rival when he was in high school, when he
Speaker 1: signed to be a Wildcat, when he played for Kentucky,
Speaker 1: there was no UFL rivalry. They didn't play it was Tennessee.
Speaker 1: Jack loves to beat the balls. It wasn't easy when
Speaker 1: he was there because back then at the same time,
Speaker 1: Tennessee had Bernie and Ernie. But Kentucky knocks off Tennessee.
Speaker 1: You could hear the glee in Jack's voice sitting alongside Tom.
Speaker 1: He loves to see these UK players knock down shots
Speaker 1: because that's what he did. He was a knockdown shooter.
Speaker 1: And as he said on my show a week or
Speaker 1: two ago, he is an unabashed fan. He said. He
Speaker 1: credits and appreciates the fact that the network and UK
Speaker 1: both realize that unlike a lot of people who might
Speaker 1: have taken over at the job when our friend, the
Speaker 1: great Mike Pratt passed away, Jack's a fan first and
Speaker 1: then a broadcaster, never claimed to be a journalist. So
Speaker 1: he roots unabashedly for those cats, especially when they win
Speaker 1: a game like that, knocking down shots at the arch
Speaker 1: rival for him, at any rate, his favorite art rival, Tennessee.
Speaker 1: So I hope you enjoyed that, all right. Coming up next,
Speaker 1: we're going to hear more about a photographer here in
Speaker 1: town who's terrific. He's done a lot of great sports work,
Speaker 1: and this is kind of the same but different. It's
Speaker 1: kind of tough talking about photography on the radio, but
Speaker 1: you'll know what I'm talking about when we chat with
Speaker 1: Mark Nielsen. That's next year on six thirty. Welcome back
Speaker 1: to you. The Big Blue Insider joining us now is
Speaker 1: a longtime friend and a guy who actually has been
Speaker 1: on the show before. It's been a while, but I
Speaker 1: see Mark Corneilsen's face in the newspaper online, you see
Speaker 1: his work, You know his work very likely. He is
Speaker 1: a terrifically talented photographer who has you know, shot dozens
Speaker 1: and hundreds of ball games. But he's become known as
Speaker 1: the pre eminent, in my opinion, portrait photographer here in
Speaker 1: town for a number of reasons. H Mark, welcome back
Speaker 1: to the show.
Speaker 10: First of all, yeah, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: We talked to Mark about some other types of portraits
Speaker 1: that he has taken, and again you've seen his work.
Speaker 1: He has shot Kentucky coaches and players. It's the black
Speaker 1: and white photos that you might see in the paper
Speaker 1: or the pop up online, really stark contrast, always black
Speaker 1: and white. You know one thing I also noticed, Mark,
Speaker 1: do your subjects in those photos ever smile?
Speaker 10: Well?
Speaker 14: But with the I used to tell my bosses of
Speaker 14: the Herald Leader because they asked me the same question.
Speaker 10: Really, somebody has that magic.
Speaker 14: If they have that magic Johnson smile, then you use
Speaker 14: it all day. But I'd say still, the majority of
Speaker 14: people who are getting a portrait made are not super
Speaker 14: comfortable at that moment, So trying to get a smile
Speaker 14: out of him sometimes is more of a challenge.
Speaker 1: Yeah. One of my faves was Colena Azabukie. You took
Speaker 1: a preseason photo of him, and of course he had
Speaker 1: that incredible physique and man, his muscles in front of
Speaker 1: your camera and your life just rippled. But I don't
Speaker 1: know what you were. Do you remember telling me the
Speaker 1: story about how he pumped himself up for that photo.
Speaker 14: Yeah, well, he when he found out what we were doing,
Speaker 14: and he saw a quick sample we were doing, and
Speaker 14: you know, obviously the sample was not him, it was
Speaker 14: somebody else sitting in. So he saw the potential for
Speaker 14: the shadows. He broke down, started doing a few push ups,
Speaker 14: started running around the concourse a few times. So I
Speaker 14: was you know, they're all a collaboration. You know, you
Speaker 14: need that, you need everybody involved. And so when they're
Speaker 14: going that far. I know they're involved.
Speaker 1: I think somebody had told him that Chuck Hayes might
Speaker 1: have looked a little bit better that day.
Speaker 14: And there's a lot of banter going on.
Speaker 1: For sure, he was not going to be outdone. But
Speaker 1: one of the reasons we wanted to talk to Mark
Speaker 1: was because now you've got a new way of doing things,
Speaker 1: a new style that those We did a TV story
Speaker 1: on Mark when he was taking those black and whites,
Speaker 1: because the camera you use was something out of the
Speaker 1: forties and now you're using a style that goes even
Speaker 1: older than the forties.
Speaker 10: Right, Yeah, we're back.
Speaker 14: We're back to the eighteen hundreds now with this new uh,
Speaker 14: with this new challenge, I'm trying.
Speaker 10: To work out what is it called?
Speaker 1: What is that?
Speaker 14: What it's called wet plate colodean is the technical term,
Speaker 14: but most people know it by the term of ten type,
Speaker 14: and it's the way photos were taken all through the
Speaker 14: Civil War. Every picture you see of Abraham Lincoln was
Speaker 14: shot this way, although his were a lot time shot
Speaker 14: on glass. It's the same process they used to shoot
Speaker 14: them all on glass. But what was happening was the
Speaker 14: Civil War soldiers were wanting to mail their photos home
Speaker 14: to their families, and the photos weren't making it because
Speaker 14: the glass was breaking before they got home. So a
Speaker 14: guy in eighteen fifty one figured out how to do
Speaker 14: it on metal, and that was the way photography was
Speaker 14: done for about.
Speaker 10: The next forty years before film was invented.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so when you're watching a movie that's set in
Speaker 1: that period and they had that big box of a
Speaker 1: camera and everybody's got a hold perfectly still and they
Speaker 1: pull the thing off the lens, those were similar kinds of.
Speaker 10: Photography, exactly the same.
Speaker 14: And sometimes you would even see somebody holding stuff up
Speaker 14: that would cause an explosion, and that was their version
Speaker 14: of a flash at the time. Because these are very
Speaker 14: not light sensitive plates compared to today's cameras and even film.
Speaker 14: You know, you're used to buy film in different speeds
Speaker 14: based on where you were shooting, and you started at
Speaker 14: one hundred and went up to thirty two hundred or more.
Speaker 14: These plates are one wow, so not a lot of
Speaker 14: You need a lot of lights. So people were having
Speaker 14: to hold still either hold still for a you know,
Speaker 14: several sometimes up to thirty seconds. Other times you hit
Speaker 14: him with a flash, which is what I'm doing.
Speaker 10: It's a lot more instant.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, one of the ones you've posted on social
Speaker 1: media is a great image of Devin Burke's you Can't
Speaker 1: Catch Her. Let's bring this back to sports, and he's
Speaker 1: standing in the stadium in uniform, he's got his catcher's
Speaker 1: gear on, the tools of ignorance and he's just looking
Speaker 1: out toward the field to his left. And just given
Speaker 1: the style of this photography, it's it's black and white.
Speaker 1: I won't say it's harsh, but there's a lot of contrast,
Speaker 1: and you know, it almost looks like it's a gray
Speaker 1: kind of cloudy day. But that's the style, isn't it.
Speaker 14: Yeah, I mean these that you know that there's not
Speaker 14: a lot of latitude as far as exposure and the
Speaker 14: different tones these things could see back then, yea. And
Speaker 14: he was actually about a two second picture there, so
Speaker 14: we knew. And you know, that's looks like it could
Speaker 14: have been shot in the Bay Bruce era, you know,
Speaker 14: as far as there really are timeless And that's what
Speaker 14: drew me back to it, you know. I just I
Speaker 14: had somebody tell me at the Lexaban Camera Club once
Speaker 14: that they loved my work, but that I seem to
Speaker 14: be going backwards.
Speaker 10: And I said, about as quickly as possible.
Speaker 1: So why did you pose Devin like that? Because I've
Speaker 1: told this story before. We did a TV story on you,
Speaker 1: and at the end of it, you had me sit
Speaker 1: for a picture, not of this type, but of the
Speaker 1: previous but the older camera, and we went down to
Speaker 1: the TV set and I thought, I would, you know,
Speaker 1: sit at the anchor desk and pose like an idiot?
Speaker 1: And you had me turn around with my back to
Speaker 1: the cameras and put my feet up on the railing.
Speaker 1: And I asked you later, you know, why did you
Speaker 1: pose me like that? And you said, I don't remember.
Speaker 1: You said, because that's you, my personality.
Speaker 10: So yeah, go ahead, go ahead, now, go ahead.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, you clearly put a lot of
Speaker 1: thought into into these poses. Now do you usually make
Speaker 1: the suggestions or does your subject make suggests? Since how
Speaker 1: does that work?
Speaker 10: You know?
Speaker 14: Like I said, it's always a group decision. But a
Speaker 14: lot of times I'm my wheels start turning as soon
Speaker 14: as I know that person's coming, especially if I have
Speaker 14: any familiarity with them, which you know a lot of
Speaker 14: the athletes, of course I did, but with even normal people,
Speaker 14: normal people, non athletes, you know that people like ourselves, right, Yeah.
Speaker 14: You know, while I'm sitting there talking to them and
Speaker 14: I'm giving them some of the history and telling them things,
Speaker 14: I'm watching their mannerisms. I'm seeing what they're doing with
Speaker 14: their hands with you know, just in general, especially if
Speaker 14: I don't know them, and sometimes in the middle of
Speaker 14: our conversation, I'll say, hold it, that's what we're doing
Speaker 14: right there. You know, they'll just stop and they'll have
Speaker 14: their hand a certain way, or they'll be looking a
Speaker 14: certain way because otherwise, like I said, like the small
Speaker 14: in front of a camera, people stiffing up. Yeah, and
Speaker 14: so you know, I've gotten pretty good with the banter myself,
Speaker 14: you know. So you're talking them through, You're trying to
Speaker 14: get them comfortable really quick, because you know, really photography
Speaker 14: is you're dipping into somebody's life for you know, maybe
Speaker 14: a half hour probably less, and you got to get
Speaker 14: that shot and go, especially in the old journalism world
Speaker 14: where you told you had five minutes with somebody, you know,
Speaker 14: So trying to read people quickly and get something that
Speaker 14: really says something about them is what I'm trying to do.
Speaker 14: Show off their personality and a lot of times, those
Speaker 14: fake smiles, aren't it.
Speaker 1: Oh no, And you know people in mine I always.
Speaker 14: Liked the intensity of the athletes, you know, so I
Speaker 14: told that. I used to tell my bosses at the paper.
Speaker 14: I was like, you know, they want to look cool,
Speaker 14: and I want to make them look cool. And you know,
Speaker 14: them with a big cheesy smile on their face acting
Speaker 14: like they're fighting over a trophy or something is not
Speaker 14: what they want.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 14: They want to look like they're getting ready to come
Speaker 14: down to the railroad tracks on you.
Speaker 1: So what were you trying to say about Devin Burks
Speaker 1: the way you posed him?
Speaker 14: Well, he was just he's a very laid back kid,
Speaker 14: you know, as far as but also very present. You know,
Speaker 14: he was into all of it.
Speaker 10: You know.
Speaker 14: We did about three different pictures and we did a
Speaker 14: real tight one with him with his mask on. We
Speaker 14: did a three quarter with him with his arms crossed,
Speaker 14: you know, which just looks cool, but it's also and
Speaker 14: then I was like, we need to let this picture
Speaker 14: breathe a little bit, you know, I wanted some more
Speaker 14: environment in it, and so just putting him off to
Speaker 14: the side and you know, having him you know a
Speaker 14: lot of times while we were talking. He was standing
Speaker 14: almost just like that. So I was like, that's exactly
Speaker 14: what we want. But let's go over here and do it,
Speaker 14: because I just want to fill in that background a
Speaker 14: little more and give some atmosphere.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well it'd work, brother. I appreciate it, really, really impressive.
Speaker 1: It's on again. It's on Mark's Facebook page if you
Speaker 1: want to go Mark Cornelis and c R N E L.
Speaker 1: S O N. You got several pictures of Santa Claus,
Speaker 1: Jack Patty.
Speaker 14: Yeah, well, Jack Patty's been a he he loves the
Speaker 14: process and you know, especially as as Santa, so we've
Speaker 14: photographed him several times. And I'm actually going to be
Speaker 14: a big part of a photo show at the end
Speaker 14: of this year called the Louisville Photo Biennial, and I'm
Speaker 14: going to have a show up in Frankfurt in the
Speaker 14: Grand Theater, big list of people that I want to
Speaker 14: put in there. You know, I want it to be
Speaker 14: your everyday guy, civilian if you will. But also I've
Speaker 14: just got too much history with a lot of the
Speaker 14: athletes and even some that I don't know, but I've
Speaker 14: been around him so much. I'm like, I think this
Speaker 14: will work. So I've got you know, I want to
Speaker 14: get Goose Gibbings in there. I want to get Derek
Speaker 14: Ramsey in there.
Speaker 10: You know, I'm trying to get hold of Tim Couch. Also.
Speaker 14: I have some old high school pictures of Tim Couch
Speaker 14: I think he'd probably love to have at some point.
Speaker 14: But you know, I want to mix in some of
Speaker 14: that history with with you know, your your with everybody else.
Speaker 10: I think it'd be kind.
Speaker 14: Of a cool also a document of Kentucky because the
Speaker 14: cool thing about this process I'm doing now is these
Speaker 14: pictures will last one hundred and seventy five years.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, wow.
Speaker 14: And they say this is the most photographed generation ever
Speaker 14: that will have nothing to show for it in twenty
Speaker 14: years because it's all on a device.
Speaker 1: That's right, That's exactly right. Do you You mentioned Jack
Speaker 1: and Derek and Tim, and you've shot, as I said,
Speaker 1: scores of athletes and games. I guess you don't get
Speaker 1: to do that as much. Do you miss that? Because
Speaker 1: your your your work now is people posing as opposed
Speaker 1: to action photos, which is one reason I know young
Speaker 1: photographers like to go towards sports to capture action. Do
Speaker 1: you miss that?
Speaker 14: I miss it sometimes, but I don't miss it. As
Speaker 14: you know, I was able to do so many amazing
Speaker 14: things when I was at the paper in Cuba's and
Speaker 14: some Super Bowls and other things that I just couldn't
Speaker 14: be happier with the way that ended up. And especially
Speaker 14: with let's say, UK basketball. It's such a crowded floor
Speaker 14: down there, yep. And yes, I could get a seat,
Speaker 14: but I'd rather just let some new guy who really
Speaker 14: wants to be there have that seat and experience what
Speaker 14: I did, you know. So I go every now and then,
Speaker 14: and if I do, sometimes I'll go and I'll take
Speaker 14: one of these old cameras and shoot with it just
Speaker 14: to see what I can get. And it's fun and
Speaker 14: that kind of thing. And every now and then I
Speaker 14: help out athletics if they need another shooter, you know,
Speaker 14: to do the real Yeah. In general, I just don't.
Speaker 14: I don't feel like I need to crowd up that baseline,
Speaker 14: Lenk give it.
Speaker 10: Let the young guys have it.
Speaker 1: Do you aspire to take any kind of photo of
Speaker 1: Mark Pope, any kind of portrait?
Speaker 10: Oh?
Speaker 14: Absolutely. And the funny thing is that picture of Mark
Speaker 14: Pope getting off the bus in ninety six where he's
Speaker 14: holding up the trophy that that was my photo.
Speaker 10: Oh really, So I'm.
Speaker 14: Already ready for him because I told Ded Moore, I said, look,
Speaker 14: that's my photo. So Mark already owes me. You know,
Speaker 14: wait that picture. That picture was his signature when he
Speaker 14: first got here, so.
Speaker 1: Which they recreated when he came in.
Speaker 10: Off the bus right right. So I felt I felt
Speaker 10: proud that day.
Speaker 14: And you know when I see the kids holding up
Speaker 14: the holding it up in the in the eruption zone,
Speaker 14: I'm like, yeah, I love that. So I told her
Speaker 14: I was going to wait till the Mark Pope waves
Speaker 14: kind of subsided, but of course that's not going to
Speaker 14: probably be till after the season.
Speaker 10: So I'm just waiting my turn on that one.
Speaker 1: Anytime it happens, it'll be great. Is Mark Cornelissen. Cornelison
Speaker 1: ten Types is the company. But go to Facebook if
Speaker 1: you want to see what his work looks like. Mark,
Speaker 1: always a pleasure, you know. I love your work. Congratulations
Speaker 1: and best of luck.
Speaker 10: Thanks so much, Dick. I appreciate you.
Speaker 1: It really is great what Mark does. This style of
Speaker 1: photography and the style that he was doing before with
Speaker 1: the old nineteen forty whatever cam was great as well,
Speaker 1: just just something different because there are just millions of
Speaker 1: images out there and Mark has taken this the standard
Speaker 1: sports images through the years. What came up with? Something new,
Speaker 1: something different, and I urge you to check it out.
Speaker 1: Thanks to Mark, Thanks to Sean Woods, thanks to Darryl Bird.
Speaker 1: That's a good night from the garage in Lexington.
Speaker 6: These pretzels are making me thirsty.
Speaker 3: These pretzels are making me thirsty.
Speaker 11: No no, see that's no good. You don't know how
Speaker 11: to act.
Speaker 13: These are pretzels. I'm making me thirsty.
Speaker 8: Nata