John Calipari Comments on Moving SEC Tournament to Preseason

Kentucky Wildcats men's basketball coach John Calipari believes a radical change should be made regarding the conference tourney.

According to ESPN.com's Jeff Goodman, Coach Cal wants the tournament moved to the preseason and no longer wants it to carry an automatic bid to March Madness:

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I'm not a big proponent of the league tournament.

Let's not have a postseason tournament. Let's have a preseason tournament where you're guaranteed three games. We go somewhere and all the fans come in and we celebrate our league. We'll have great games to start the year, and we'll do it prior to the year.

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He took things a step further on Twitter by proposing an event that would allow fans to watch multiple SEC tournament games at once:

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Why don't we play the games in the football stadium in Atlanta and set up two courts with stands split down the middle?

You could play the games where fans can go from side to side and watch multiple games.

You could even have the winner's bracket on one court and the loser's bracket on the other court.

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Calipari also believes the automatic NCAA tournament berth should go to the regular-season conference champion. He said winning the conference tourney "doesn't move the needle" and further explained his preseason idea:

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You have to do it in November. Play a game or two and then, out of the gate, you have a conference tournament. You know you have it for one week. Maybe you have two sites in the same city. Maybe it's in Atlanta. You're doing it every year. Let's all [have] our fans go to Atlanta and everything is geared for the SEC.

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While an anonymous SEC assistant called Calipari's idea "good," per Goodman, he doesn't have much support, according to Jon Solomon of CBSSports.com:

Last season, after Kentucky beat eventual No. 3 seed Texas A&M to win the SEC tournament, the fourth-seeded Wildcats lost in the second round to fifth-seeded Indiana.

Some fans might take issue with removing automatic bids because of the intrigue they create, but in the end, the money generated from conference tournaments may be the biggest reason why Calipari's idea seems improbable.

Follow @MikeChiari on Twitter.