John Calipari has rubbed people the wrong way with his brash comments in the past but it’s rare that the offended party is someone on the same campus.
In an interview conducted while in the Bahamas, poor downtrodden Coach Cal complained about the fact that he doesn’t have a brand new practice facility for his basketball team that has won exactly one national championship in the last 24 years. Worth noting is the fact that Kentucky football coach Mark Stoops has also recently been public about asking for facilities upgrades, a request that Kentucky seems more than willing to comply with, especially given the Wildcats nearly unprecedented stretch of consistency on the football field under Stoops.
Meanwhile, Calipari attempted to compare his program to the football programs at Alabama and Georgia and somehow it came out like this:
"This is a basketball school. Alabama is a football school. So is Georgia. No disrespect to our football team. I hope they win 10 games and go to bowls. But this is a basketball school."
John Calipari wants his practice facility ASAP.https://t.co/0zlHJxlXmT
— Kyle Tucker (@KyleTucker_ATH) August 11, 2022
Yikes.
Despite the “no disrespect” caveat, Mark Stoops did, in fact, appear to take offense and he didn’t take it quietly.
Basketball school? I thought we competed in the SEC? #4straightpostseasonwins https://t.co/xUoKmUeonH
— Mark Stoops (@UKCoachStoops) August 11, 2022
Kentucky basketball, notably, has not won four straight postseason games, most recently losing in the first round of the NCAA Tournament to 15-seed St. Peter’s.
Stoops’ comments seemed to open the floodgates on one of Twitter’s favorite pastimes, dunking on Kentucky basketball.
Get his ass Mark https://t.co/DHo9ZKMHZv
— VECNA GIRL SUMMER (@HollyAnderson) August 11, 2022
We have Kentucky's football coach getting publicly mad about basketball's influence on campus. T-minus one year until Mark Stoops takes the A&M job. He'll be at Bama by 2028 https://t.co/yvPv7ifgET
— Alex Kirshner (@alex_kirshner) August 11, 2022
https://t.co/IeLDvIFNbR pic.twitter.com/StVVvuxo1E
— BUM CHILLUPS AKA SPENCER HALL (@edsbs) August 11, 2022
Completely out of the blue question but has the Kentucky football team ever lost to St.Peters? 💙
— Max Duffy (@Max__Duffy) August 11, 2022
Kentucky football and Kentucky basketball pic.twitter.com/zq0fZ9Lqx6
— Pregame Empire (@PregameEmpire) August 11, 2022
I’m case you thought this Twitter back-and-forth was a joke. Also worth noting, even at Kentucky football generates more revenue than men’s basketball. pic.twitter.com/r914V3iwyW
— Jon Hale (@JonHale_HL) August 11, 2022
well we’re finally all actually here to see kentucky for once
— Brice (@dBriceJ) August 11, 2022
