John Calipari raved about Kentucky‘s opening-round matchup within the NCAA Event, the Oakland Golden Grizzlies, led by a longtime good friend in Greg Kampe. The 2 truly texted following the Horizon League Event, joking that they’d most likely be paired up within the Massive Dance following Oakland’s 83-76 win over Milwaukee to punch a ticket.
After which it truly occurred.
“Greg Kampe and I are actually good buddies. We go approach again,” Calipari mentioned Sunday. “He’s not an excellent coach, he’s a terrific coach. He’s been doing it there for a very long time. … He may very well be teaching wherever. There are all these jobs open proper now, I don’t know why somebody wouldn’t say let’s go get Greg Kampe. He’s good.”
As for the personnel itself, the Golden Grizzlies play a “tandem zone, sort of a matchup hybrid,” Calipari mentioned, “however they’re additionally good on offense.” Trey Townsend earned Horizon League Participant of the Yr honors as a “huge, sturdy child inside” whereas they’ve obtained two absolute snipers in Blake Lampman and Jack Gohlke “who mix to take 20 threes.”
“When you’ve gotten an opportunity like that the place you may make threes and you bought that one participant you can attempt to go to, it means you’re going to have an opportunity,” Calipari mentioned. “You’re going to have an opportunity. We’re good, they’re good, let’s see the place we’re once we play on Thursday.”
However what concerning the different facet of the battle? How is Oakland feeling forward of the head-to-head contest in Pittsburgh? Surprisingly sufficient, that is the matchup they wished all alongside.
For starters, it’s a possibility to play the perfect of the perfect on faculty basketball’s largest and brightest stage. Who wouldn’t need that shot?
“The matchup is actually vital. For me, this was the perfect matchup I feel we might get as we have been attempting to determine all of it out. I believed we might be on the 13-seed line as a result of primarily based on standards that’s the place I believed we have been going to fall. The seeding of the event this yr was so loopy, I’m simply glad we’re in it. So I’m not going to complain,” Kampe mentioned on Tuesday with 97.1 The Ticket in Michigan. “But when I might have picked a group that we have been — I didn’t wish to play Iowa State after watching them play Houston, I didn’t wish to play Creighton due to their skill to shoot. I simply thought Kentucky was the perfect matchup for us for a pair causes.
“One is that is primetime, we get to play at 7 o’clock on CBS with the A-team on the telecast, all of that stuff. That’s what you need if you’re on this, you need your children to have an opportunity to be within the highlight. That was primary. Quantity two, you bought possibly the most important blue blood of all of them. You’ve obtained a coach that — I feel the man in East Lansing (Tom Izzo) is the perfect coach within the nation, however Cal is true there with him.”
It’s not simply concerning the alternative, although. By way of taking part in kinds and particular person personnel, he preferred his group towards Kentucky over a few of the different faculties with comparable seed-lines within the projections.
This was the one he wished as a result of Wildcats’ lack of inside scoring presence.
“You’ve obtained all that after which most significantly, they don’t rating within the submit, Kampe added. “For a mid-major, that’s an Achilles heels if you play groups that may rating within the submit. It actually impacts you defensively.
“So since they don’t rating within the submit, our skill to possibly guard the three and to maintain the sport gradual, we’ve an opportunity. We actually do, if we will hold the sport gradual and take the three away from them.”
That’s a reasonably assured reply for a No. 14 seed. We’ll see if it holds up on Thursday.