Kentucky vs. Kansas Score: John Calipari Adds Title to Controversial Legacy

John Calipari is controversial, polarizing and after Monday's win, he is now a champion. 

It's a new day in college basketball, and the pliable way he coaches is perfect for the one-and-done era. You can call into question a great number of things in his past, but there is no doubting that he can build a winner. 

The Kentucky Wildcats delivered one knockout punch after another in this tournament and never really suffered from a malaise of boredom or an over-inflated sense of self worth. 

In the end, they cruised to a championship, beating Kansas 67-59. 

Many have come before the 2012 Kentucky Wildcats, and a great many runners-up were supposed to win it all. 

It can be a curse to be so good in a tournament that produces so many odd results. 

Yet, Calipari had his young men playing above their years from a maturity standpoint. Instead of several NBA-bound superstars playing for themselves, they played for one another. 

There was no more blatant show of this than on the defensive part of the court. Kentucky had some awful sloppy moments in last night's victory over the Kansas Jayhawks, but you never really had that feeling the game would ever be in jeopardy, even when Kansas mounted an 11th hour comeback

Every last player had their colleague's back. Kentucky may have had 11 turnovers to Kansas' nine, but a great many of them saw the team corralling to make sure those mistakes never bit them in the end. 

Calipari did a tremendous job in what is a new era of college hoops. 

Many whine about the one-and-done era, but Calipari has instead decided to embrace it. There is no indication that it is going to change anytime soon, so it's best to conform to how things are done if you want to build a winner. 

The cycle of reloading every couple years for big programs has now turned into a turnover rate of a few months. 

The recruiting never ends for head coaches in the college ranks, and Coach Cal is the best. 

His legacy will still have the mark of Final Four finishes that were rescinded by the NCAA, but it will now have a national title as its marquee highlight. 

That means John Calipari is doing something right, and there is no taking that away. 

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