Ashley Scoby
By ASHLEY SCOBY
I’m officially back in the United States after a trip to South Africa, and it looks like Kentucky basketball still hasn’t stopped. No surprises here.
Probably the biggest “news” that dropped while I was overseas was the continuing debate about the Cats’ schedule for the upcoming season. People haven’t stopped debating the conclusion of the UK-Indiana series, and Notre Dame was just added to the schedule as part of the 2012 Big East/SEC challenge. Let’s discuss:
I write for a variety of sites and on Twitter about Kentucky basketball, and I talk about it to virtually anyone who will listen. But I haven’t sounded off yet about the ending of the IU series. It’s an overall feeling of disappointment that I get from the Indiana news. Although UK lost this year in Bloomington, that game was still the best game of the Kentucky-Indiana series in QUITE a while. It’s a shame that the series ended at the time that it did.
However, maybe this will be for the best for both programs. Taking a break from a series isn’t always a bad thing. When Kentucky and Louisville finally renewed their basketball series after a LONG drought from playing each other, the first game in the series was hugely anticipated. Can you imagine if the Cats were to pick up the IU series 15 years from now? The anticipation would be enormous, and would undoubtedly create a game for the ages.
And think about it this way: If Kentucky and Indiana somehow run into each other in the NCAA tournament again (the selection committee certainly has quite the sense of humor), that game will again be looked forward to by everyone in the nation. Kentucky and Duke don’t play each other on a yearly basis, but when a tournament matchup was predicted between those two teams in this year’s tournament, people were going crazy. The thought of the Cats and the Blue Devils finally being matched up again was a dream come true for basketball fans nationwide, so maybe the situation would be the same for Indiana in the future.
Speaking of the future, how does Notre Dame fit into all of this? Although the Notre Dame game this season is just a one-time occurrence, maybe it could turn into something more. With Coach Cal at the helm, innovation is constantly a factor in the schedule (and everything else having to do with the program). I wouldn’t be totally shocked if Calipari decided to start a new series – to put his own stamp on the program’s history. Maybe it will be Notre Dame – Kentucky fans do have some bad blood with the Irish, after they knocked the Cats out of the NIT during Gillispie’s time at UK. Maybe it could be another team like Duke, Syracuse or Georgetown.
Either way, Kentucky has had some great history with the Hoosiers, but most good things have to come to an end eventually. I, along with many Kentucky fans, am quite disappointed that the series had to end in the way that it did, but maybe it’s time for a change. If we’ve learned one thing from the past few years, it’s that Kentucky basketball endures, and the program can survive just about anything. Although the ending of a series with Indiana isn’t anything that needs to be survived, it’s certainly something that the program will have to at least adapt to.
With Cal in charge, count me as one who believes everything will turn out for the best in regards to scheduling.
10 Responses to Not playing Indiana might be best for both programs and let Notre Dame develop into something special for Cats
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bad blood wtih notre dame ? really? knocking uk out of the n.i.t. ! ha! first, uk in the n.i.t. really is depressing. secondly , i just don’t see how that loss to notre dame really is sticking in anyones craw. Gillespie was done after that loss wasn’t he? That should be celebrated not looked at as a bad thing. Look , notre dame is a football school and thats where their heart is, they are in no way in the class of syracuse , georgetown, or duke as far as a basketball foe in terms of national interest. Cal is a master salesman and its hard to doubt him but, say uk plays notre dame on an aircraft carrier or duke on an aircraft carrier there is no doubt which game draws the most interest. I really could care less about the irish. That game means way more to them than it does to us by a longshot.
Why are we still talking about the KY-IU series being dropped ?? IU & Crean did the dropping and now they want people to believe that it is KY’s fault the the series has become a thing of the past. Cal & KY has been VERY nice about this whole mess. IU has acted like nothing happened at the game or in town to the FEW KY fans that was at the game in Bloomington. I have stated this before because I KNOW from experience how IU fans act. What KY fans stated happened at the game is true. The problem here is Crean thought he could bully KY but what he forgot is he NEEDS to play KY and KY doesn’t need to play IU. When you have been NOTHING for a long as IU has been then you need to play top teams but when you are the National Champion you don’t need to play a team that is coming off PROBATION and one you beat in the NCAA Tourn.
Very well said. IU thought they could get the national press to pressure UK into playing in that rat hole they play in but of course Cal doesn’t care what the national press thinks. He knows which side his bread is buttered on. Cal is the perfect UK coach IMO. He isn’t afraid to tell teams like IU to take a flying leap. IMO IU has been asking for this to happen for a long time. With Knightmare running his mouth and Davis telling the world how he hates UK what did they expect? Then to act like they won a world war when they just won a basketball game was just way over the top. And they wanted to do it again. Yeah right. UK fans are never going back to Bloomington in our lifetime and I couldn’t be happier.
BTW some of us remember when the real Indiana team was Notre Dame and UK played them every year. That was before IU became good. UK was around a long time before IU became good. And they will be good for a long time after IU is back to being bad again.
UK got to humiliate Digger Phelps back in those days when the rivalry was with ND. He was 4-12 against UK and 2 of those wins came against UK’s weakest teams in the last 75 years which were Joe B.’s .500 season and the year of the sinking ship before the sanctions when the Cats actually had a losing record. It’s no wonder Digger still hates UK. It must something in the water in Indiana. All their coaches seem to end up hating UK. Crean is supposed to be Cal’s friend but this end of the series thing could drive a wedge between them. Crean overstepped when he tried to push UK around. It was really, really stupid on his part. Now that he knows it won’t work will he get bitter too? I guess we’ll see.
sorry here but i vacated the two seasons billy gillispie was coach.
Agreed, metalarmdad – I think IU needs to be play Kentucky a lot more than Kentucky needs to play IU. Grant, Notre Dame is definitely not close to Duke or Syracuse, but it could be an interesting series. Just an idea. Trust me, I would much rather see the Cats play Duke on a yearly basis, but I don’t know how likely that is.
Ashley, Calipari said Tuesday talks are still ongoing with Duke about annual series
I would be ecstatic if something came out of this. Would love to play Duke on a regular basis.
Amen to that Ashley
king , phelps and knight both started in 71 for repective indiana teams and knight had pretty good record right off the bat for indiana.
I guess I was thinking of the Johnny Dee coached ND teams. They were extremely good and had been for years with players like Austin Carr leading the charge. They ended the great UCLA win streak for example. They were ranked high every year and UK had been playing them long before the Indiana series really got rolling. The first couple of years UK played a Bob Knight coached team those IU teams were not ranked at all. But UK was in a transition period and lost several games to Knight’s teams despite the fact that UK was ranked and IU wasn’t at first.
UK had played ND from 1958 on pretty much every year in a game at Freedom Hall. Those 1960′s ND teams were very good and at that time Knight was still coaching at Army. That’s what got me thinking about the fact that ND had been the major rival for UK back then. ND had other greats during that time period too like Adrian Dantley. These were some of the best players to ever play the game in fact. Carr averaged 35 ppg during his time at ND and Dantley averaged 25. He had seasons where he averaged 28 and 30 ppg. He was a great player along with Carr and those ND teams were extremely good.
Yes Knight came along and got things going but not right at first. It took a while for him to get rolling while ND had been a great team for well over a decade at the time. ND was by far the bigger rivalry really until 1975. Remember this was the time of the transition from Rupp to Hall and the last team of great players signed by Rupp didn’t really blossom under Hall until their senior year. The Super Kittens, as they were known, became great players after the freshmen class that included Givens and Robey came along. But Hall had a year when the team played .500 ball.
Anyway what I was getting at was the fact that ND was a much bigger rivalry early in the 1970′s and going back through the 60′s. IU came along later and became a big rival by beating Rupp’s last teams and Hall’s first team. Digger really couldn’t keep the level of play going that Dee established but he did quite well when he had Dantley playing for him. IMO it was UK that really knocked ND down from the heights after Phelps took over. And this was also before Knight became a nut case or at least he didn’t show it at first. I think he lost it when UK beat his ’75 team in the tournament. He’s hated UK ever since.