When Arkansas head coach John Calipari walks into Rupp Arena in Lexington on Saturday evening, he'll do so by walking out of a locker room and through a tunnel that will look unfamiliar to him.
The first-year Head Hog is returning to his old stomping grounds for the first time since he left the place he called home as the head coach at Kentucky for 15 years. Now as Arkansas' head coach, he'll be standing by the visitor’s bench.
"Yeah, it’ll be interesting, but I’m just preparing my team and we’re going to have three players who played there," Calipari said during his weekly radio show Monday night. "My guess is, they’re going to get booed, my guess is, I’m going to get booed. But that’s all part of it."
It won't just be Adou Thiero, D.J. Wagner and Zvonimir Ivisic — the three players who followed Calipari to Arkansas — who will face that raucous environment. All eight of Arkansas' healthy rotational players will need to be at their best if they hope to upset the Wildcats.
"You know what I’m thinking about? Our next game,” Calipari said. “How do I get these players to continue to believe? ...One of the things I said to each of them is, 'What do you do, you personally, to get your confidence? To get you to walk in and know that you’re going to play well? Is there something you do in the game? Is there something I can do to help you get going?' And so, this is, as hard as it is on all of us, think of those players in that uniform.”
Calipari has had a rough go of it in his first season as the Razorbacks' head coach. The Hogs are 12-8 overall, have won just one of their seven games of Southeastern Conference play, and are headed into one of the most storied arenas in college basketball.
Despite the pomp and circumstance that Calipari will likely feel, he said he's focused on preparing his team for war.
"I told them, if we had won the games we were supposed to and maybe stole one, we’re in the hunt and we’re not that far off," Calipari said. "But I’m telling you, you’re going to have to take someone’s lunch money. They’re not giving it to you. Just how it is, it is going to be hard."
That sentiment isn't reserved for just Saturday's game between the Razorbacks and the Wildcats. The SEC as a whole is incredibly tough among all 16 teams, and even the Wildcats have had a rough go of it in recent games, as they've lost their last two games to Alabama and Vanderbilt, plus they play at Tennessee on Tuesday night.
Still, Kentucky is ranked No. 12 in the country, and for good reason. First-year Kentucky head coach Mark Pope has his team with a 14-5 overall record and are 3-3 in league play with six Quad 1 wins and no Quad 3 or 4 losses, according to NET rankings. The Wildcats have only lost one game at Rupp Arena this season, a 102-97 loss to Alabama.
"There will be some emotion walking into that building, and really being in town...(Kentucky is) playing good," Calipari said Saturday after the loss to Oklahoma. "We’ve got our hands full. Let’s see what happens. They’re a good team. Mark’s doing a good job with them. We’ve just got to keep going. Keep fighting. Keep figuring this out. What does this team look like? What do we have to play like?"
The split between Calipari and Kentucky wasn't the smoothest. Fans on social media have seemingly gone out of their way to pile on Calipari and his team since the Razorbacks' skid started, but there's no love lost between Calipari and his former employee and even those same fans.
"I had a great run there, fond memories," Calipari said. "Love the people, fans are great. You got some of the crazies, but that’s everywhere. The fans are great because they care about the program, they love the program there and they adopt the players as their own. They do. Our fans are the same."
Fans of every sports program, from the college level to the professional ranks, can be ruthless on social media. So how does Calipari fight against letting it affect him? He said he just doesn't look.
"What if I looked at social media? I don’t, so I don’t know what they’re saying," Calipari said. "And if anybody says, ‘Well so and so said,’ — stop, don’t even tell me, I don’t care, it has no bearing on me, I don’t know that person. Now, if you want to tell me what somebody that loves me and cares about me is saying, tell me. Other than that, I’m not listening."
Calipari said during his radio show in a tongue-in-cheek way that he's not looking forward to Saturday's game. Not that he's not excited to coach his team, but he said he's not sure how he'll handle the emotions when he walks back into Rupp Arena.
"I’m looking forward to coaching, but to walk in, the vibe, I don’t know how I’m going to take it to be honest with you," Calipari said. "I mean, that was a special time in my life and (Calipari's wife Ellen's) life. 15 years we gave, 15. To be on that job for 15 years, every year is dog years there, seven years. Seven years there, it’s dog years."
The Razorbacks and Wildcats will tip-off at 8 p.m. CT Saturday on ESPN.
