John Calipari Pupils Have Earned Over $2.2 Billion in the NBA

October 31, 2019 By Leave a Comment

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John Calipari has succeeded, at an extremely high level, in the National Basketball Association. What an odd sentence to describe a coach whose record in the NBA was an only 72-112, right? Well, it’s not what Calipari did while leading the New Jersey Nets (1996-1999) or his stint as a Philadelphia 76ers assistant (2000) that matters in this context.

It’s the fact that Calipari-coached players have been signed to more than $2.2 billion in NBA contracts. That’s billion with a B and $1.9 billion of that came from the University of Kentucky alone. That’s more than the GDP of the nation of Belize. In fact, Kentucky led the nation with 29 former players present on NBA opening day rosters.

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Filed Under: Business, College Basketball, Kentucky Wildcats, NBA, NBA Draft

ESPN College Gameday: How it Went From Transcendent to Unwatchable

September 7, 2019 By Leave a Comment

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Republishing from 9-16-17

To pinpoint what’s so wrong with ESPN College Gameday in 2017, there are a couple different places from which you can start. You can begin with ESPN’s horrible bungling of the Jemele Hill and Robert Lee situations, and go from there. The same principle, that of “let’s try to never hurt anyone’s feelings ever, no matter what the cost, because hurt feelings means upset sponsors” applies across the board.

ESPN should have never apologized for what Jemele Hill said about Donald Trump.

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Filed Under: Business, College Basketball, College Football, Duke Blue Devils, Entertainment/Media, Illinois Fighting Illini, Kentucky Wildcats, Michigan State Spartans, Michigan Wolverines, Nebraska Cornhuskers, North Carolina Tar Heels, Northwestern Wildcats, Notre Dame, Ohio State Buckeyes, Purdue Boilermakers

Coach Cal Makes Colorful Comments on SEC Allowing Alcohol Sales

June 7, 2019 By Leave a Comment

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With apologies to German rockers The Scorpions, the ‘Winds of Change’ are blowing socially in college sports right now; quite strongly.

Additional states have legalized sports gambling, more states are in process and then you have even more states that are working on the getting the wheels in motion on that. Then you have the movement to allow liquor sales at college sporting events that sweeping the nation. Like sports wagering, like you can do with Pinnacle welcome bonus, this movement is a run away freight train, with no indication of slowing down right now.

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Filed Under: College Basketball, Kentucky Wildcats

John Calipari Gives Epic Rant on Big Picture of College Basketball

June 7, 2019 By Leave a Comment

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Kentucky Wildcats Head Coach John Calipari was asked about his new contract extension, and to hear him tell it, he’s coach for life (or at least wants to be). If Coach Cal has his way, then Lexington will be the final stop for him before he retires.

It would make sense, given all the success he has had at Kentucky, and is expected to continue having. Kentucky is one of those programs that is a national title contender every year. New betting offers every March madness have the Wildcats, along with Duke, North Carolina, Kansas, Michigan State, Gonzaga and Villanova, as the top contenders to win it all. So UK is as high profile as it gets.

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Filed Under: College Basketball, Kentucky Wildcats

Kentucky Wildcats Early 2019-20 Season Outlook: Top Four Nationally

April 11, 2019 By Leave a Comment

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There are still a couple of major decisions yet to be made, but next year’s Kentucky Wildcats looks like a Final Four team, at least on paper.

John Calipari returns a lot of talent from a team that went 30-7 and reached the Elite Eight before bowing out in overtime to a conference rival. Every year this week (the days that follow the national title game) brings a flood of way too early top 25 rankings for the next season. Here’s where the Kentucky Wildcats stand in all of those polls:

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Filed Under: College Basketball, Kentucky Wildcats

March Madness is Big Business, How Big? Try $10 Billion

March 22, 2019 By 2 Comments

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We’re in the midst of what many declare the greatest four days on the American sports calendar- the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament. Colloquially (and trademarked) known as “March Madness,” it’s a Thursday-Sunday span that sees a field of 64 college basketball teams swiftly reduced to 16.

In order to make this happen, the games start in late morning and run until very late in the evening. It’s a time when work productivity is at its lowest because, at least for these three weekends, just about everybody is a college basketball fan. The sport only enjoys a very tiny niche following the rest of the year, but for this month, it’s front and center.

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Filed Under: Business, College Basketball, Duke Blue Devils, Kentucky Wildcats, Michigan State Spartans, Michigan Wolverines, North Carolina Tar Heels

How to Pick March Madness Upsets: Top Predictive Trends of Last Decade

March 18, 2019 By Leave a Comment

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Last St. Patrick’s Day, University of Maryland-Baltimore County shocked Virginia 74-54 to become the first No. 16 seed in the history of the NCAA tournament to ever beat a No. 1 seed.

And with that upset, the Retrievers became media darlings, lovable underdogs, breakers of brackets all over the world. Thanks to UMBC, there were just 25 perfect brackets remaining among the tens of millions submitted before March Madness began.

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Filed Under: Business, College Basketball, Duke Blue Devils, Kentucky Wildcats, Michigan State Spartans, North Carolina Tar Heels, Purdue Boilermakers

Big Ten Has Three National Title Contenders, but None are Among the Favorites

March 18, 2019 By Leave a Comment

Lots of college basketball pundits have deemed the Big Ten the strongest conference in the nation this season, and the numbers seen to verify this. From top to bottom, it’s the strongest conference in the country, but it’s strongest teams aren’t among the elite of the elite nationally.

The Big Ten has three teams, #6 Michigan State, #10 Michigan and #13 Purdue that have a legitimate shot of winning it all, but none are likely to earn a #1 seed on Selection Sunday. You won’t find any of that trio among the top favorites to be crowned kings of March Madness either. In short, the Midwestern based league, headquartered in Chicago, is just not top heavy enough.

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Filed Under: College Basketball, Duke Blue Devils, Kentucky Wildcats, Michigan State Spartans, North Carolina Tar Heels, Purdue Boilermakers Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

John Calipari Strongly Conveyed the Christmas Spirit this Week

December 24, 2018 By Leave a Comment

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After his team beat #9 North Carolina 80-72 at the United Center in Chicago, Kentucky Coach John Calipari gave a postgame press conference that had an important message- one that goes well above and beyond mere basketball. Calipari wished the media Merry Christmas, and then advised any person with the means of taking somebody in this Christmas to do so.

He was speaking about those who won’t have a place to be this Christmas. Coach Cal suggested that if you have the ability to warmly welcome one of these people into your home this holiday season, you should do so.

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Filed Under: College Basketball, Kentucky Wildcats

#9 North Carolina Tar Heels vs #19 Kentucky Wildcats: Game Preview with @DaggumRoy

December 19, 2018 By Leave a Comment

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Saturday brings the CBS Sports Classic, a college basketball double header featuring four of the sport’s most storied programs, to the United Center in Chicago. It’s UCLA vs. #15 Ohio State in the undercard (game preview at this link), tipping off at 2pm CST. The heavyweight bout is the #9 North Carolina Tar Heels vs. the #19 Kentucky Wildcats; tipping off at 4:15 local.
Now there are plenty of industry standard game preview articles out there for this headliner match-up, but we decided to go in a different direction. You already know how most head coach press conferences go- lots of cliches, platitudes and corporatespeak.
But what if you were able to do a Q&A with North Carolina Tar Heels Head Coach Roy Williams, and he had absolutely no filter at all during it?

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Filed Under: College Basketball, Kentucky Wildcats, North Carolina Tar Heels

College Sports Fans Beware the Nefarious Influence of the Recruiting-Industrial Complex

August 28, 2018 By 1 Comment

It’s really astounding when you think about it- in an era when almost no one is willing to pay for news content, recruiting services can survive and thrive off a subscription-based business model.

The year-round extensive coverage of college recruiting, at every step in the process, has destroyed media coverage of college sports. It’s not just the rise of the recruiting-industrial complex itself that ruined it. Recruiting sites flourished at the same time social media exploded and these two phenomena fed off of each other to concoct a toxic cocktail.

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Filed Under: Business, College Basketball, College Football, Duke Blue Devils, Entertainment/Media, Illinois Fighting Illini, Kentucky Wildcats, Michigan State Spartans, Michigan Wolverines, Nebraska Cornhuskers, News and Current Events, North Carolina Tar Heels, Northwestern Wildcats, Notre Dame, Ohio State Buckeyes, Purdue Boilermakers, Social Issues, Tech

2018 NBA Mock Draft 6-21-18 Final Edition

June 20, 2018 By 7 Comments

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Welcome to our fourth version of our 2018 NBA Mock Draft. It’s the first edition post lottery. For more on a given prospect, click his name where hyper-linked, and that will take you to an in-depth feature piece on said player. Team needs were sometimes, but not always taken into account, and the order was derived from Tankathon, who we linked here.

You may not agree with the picks in this 2018 NBA mock draft, and yes, somebody will get left out, but you can air your grievances in the comments section. Just keep it all above board.

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Filed Under: Chicago Bulls, College Basketball, Duke Blue Devils, Kentucky Wildcats, Lakers, Michigan State Spartans, NBA, NBA Draft, Purdue Boilermakers
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