Billy Gillispie Will Be the Savior of Kentucky Basketball

Alex Head

June 15, 2007

Coming into this year’s college basketball season, I don't expect a whole lot from first year Kentucky head coach Billy Gillispie.

Why, you might ask? Because on March 22, 2007, when Tubby Smith left Kentucky for Minnesota, I knew exactly why he had left. The reason Tubby left UK was because he knew this season was going to be a nightmare. I don’t see how UK fans could’ve possibly expected Gillispie to do great things in his first year at UK.

One reason why Kentucky is so bad this year is because he has no players to work with. Sure, he has two seniors in Joe Crawford and Ramel Bradley, but what else does he have to work with right now? Also, he has one player that he recruited in Patrick Patterson.

Other than that, he is stuck with a roster full of disappointing players that Tubby recruited.

Throughout Gillispie’s coaching career, he has coached at UTEP and Texas A&M. In Gillispie’s first year at UTEP, his team finished with a record of 6-24. The following year, Gillispie completely turned around the program by finishing with a record of 24-8, which included a bid to the NCAA Tournament.

Gillispie’s greatness continued at Texas A&M, where he dramatically improved each year. These improvements included Gillispie’s Texas A&M team winning a school-record 26 games, and receiving a No. 3 seed in the NCAA Tournament. No one can even try to tell me that Texas A&M was a basketball school before Gillispie became coach.

After learning of what great turnarounds Gillispie performed at UTEP and Texas A&M, I believe that he can do the same at Kentucky.

This season is the worst start for a Kentucky team since Rick Pitino’s first year at UK in 1989-1990. Back then Kentucky was on probation; therefore fans had no expectations.

It’s funny to me when those who loved Tubby Smith say he won a national title in his year at Kentucky, but they can’t realize that he had all of Pitino’s players that year. After that year, the program has gone downhill due to Tubby’s lack of recruiting and inability to coach at a program as great as Kentucky.

Gillispie is known as a tireless recruiter and will get the talent that we were used to seeing in the '90s. Just give Gillispie time to recruit his type of players, and we’ll be just fine.

The college basketball nation better get their bashing of Kentucky in this year, because pretty soon, we will be much improved. You watch and see. In two to three years, Kentucky will be a force to be reckoned with in college basketball once again!