Tuesday’s Kentucky-Central Arkansas game conjours an analogy as old as the Old Testament. The all-powerful titan against the weakling. Goliath versus David.
However, UK Coach Billy Gillispie recoiled from the suggestion.
“I’m not Goliath,” he said. “I’ve never been Goliath. I’ve always been the hunter.”
Gillispie tried to shun the Goliath label from Kentucky basketball, at least while he’s coach. It was a novel approach for a program that has regularly billed itself as superior to all overs.
Two of Gillispie’s predecessors spoke of UK basketball in all-powerful terms. Rick Pitino referred to the program as the Roman Empire of college basketball. With a nod to George Orwell, Eddie Sutton referred to UK as “Big Brother” to Louisville’s “Little Brother.”
Gillispie clearly prefers to be the barbarians sacking Rome.
“I’ll never be part of a group that’s hunted,” he said. “We’ll play as hunters. Every single time.”
Jerry Tipton of the Lexington Herald- Leader has covered Kentucky basketball since the 1981-82 season. That time includes five coaches, five Final Fours, four athletic directors, two interim athletic directors and many memories. Before coming to Lexington, Tipton worked eight years for the Huntington (W.Va.) Herald-Dispatch. He covered Marshall’s basketball team for two seasons before coming to the Herald-Leader.
It’s the right approach. As much as I hate to say it, we aren’t goliath anymore. We are the hunters. You got to love a coach that understands whom we are what we are looking to accomplish. He knows what he is doing. He has a level of intensity that he is looking for and isn’t going to stand for Tubby ball. Not knocking Tubbs, but how many players seemed to have heart under him (besides Bogans and Hayes)? Not many, Tubby played mind games with the players and they didnt fall for it. Gillispie will tell you straight to your face whats right or wrong. Can’t knock a stand up guy. He clearly has the passion and understanding our program needs to gain prominence again. It truly is a down time for UK basketball and he is here to bring us out of the rubble..
lol well coach has got a few things to learn give him 2 years , he has not been a coach at “THE” premiere college basketball school long enough yet.wildcat fans know who the all time winningest program is ,we know who has more sec championships than the other 11 schools in the sec combined. i think Billy G. does too. but after the program lost some of its luster under tubby (and just so you know tubbys a good man and a good coach in my opinion, hes just not the coach for kentucky)its good to see some hunger from the coach, now if he can get the players to have his demeanor we will be “THE” program again.theres nothing i love better than watching the cats play and if we are never THE program again ill always love them ,but being THE program is by far more fun. GOOOOOOO CATSSSSSS
He may want our guys to play like hunters but rest assured that the moniker of hunter and huntee, in the case of UK basketball, is determined by the desire of our opponents to knock us off. If we are, in fact, the summit of this sport as we all want to believe, then we are, in fact, the ones being hunted week in and week out. I respect Gillispie’s desire to have the team play agressively and even with a certain amount of raw hunger but we mostly have to do that because every team that comes up against us comes with bared teeth and an empty belly.
Not Goliath? How about “Goliath the Hunter–who’s hungry and mean.”