With apologies to 17th century English poet John Milton, the theme for Kentucky men’s college basketball’s two marquee programs since 2015 has been “Paradise Lost.”
From 2011 through 2015, the men’s hoops teams at Kentucky and Louisville combined to go 34-7 in NCAA Tournament games.
Of the seven losses, two were by U of L to UK and another by the Cardinals to Morehead State. That meant our state’s two flagship men’s hoops programs were 32-4 vs. teams from other states in the NCAA Tournament for a five-year period.
Alas, our state’s top dogs have not had nearly that much bite in recent years.
Louisville, which vacated much of the NCAA tourney success noted above due to NCAA rules violations, has seen its program sink beneath the weight of multiple cheating scandals. Over the past seven NCAA tournaments, the Cardinals have won one game.
Meanwhile, since 2015-16, Kentucky is 9-5 in NCAA tourney contests. That would be good at a lot of schools, but it is a far cry from the 22-4 mark the Wildcats logged in the Dance over the first six seasons of the John Calipari coaching era (2009-10 through 2014-15).
As we prepare to officially launch the 2022-23 college hoops campaign, will the commonwealth have a men’s team capable of returning to the NCAA Tournament’s “promised land?”
Below are 10 intriguing storylines to watch in Kentucky college basketball, men’s and women’s, in 2022-23:
10. Dontaie’s inferno? After a frustrating three-year stint in the UK men’s basketball program, ex-Pendleton County star Dontaie Allen has taken his talents to Western Kentucky.
In his time in Lexington (a redshirt year and two seasons of playing), Allen logged only 459 minutes and scored only 159 points. For Kentucky’s 2019 Mr. Basketball, that a was a far cry from his prolific-scoring high school days when Allen tallied a robust 3,255 career points.
Allen gets a fresh start at WKU as part of a transfer-packed roster that, on paper, looks formidable. With 7-foot-5, shot-blocking force Jamarion Sharp to erase defensive mistakes in Bowling Green, it will be fascinating to see if Rick Stansbury and Co. can unlock Allen’s considerable offensive upside.
9. Can you go home again? From 2011-15, Steve Prohm had the Murray State men’s basketball program humming. The coach went 104-29, led the Racers to four straight Ohio Valley Conference regular-season championships and reached the round of 32 in the 2012 NCAA Tournament.
Prohm parlayed his immense success at Murray State into the Iowa State head coaching job. The first four years of Prohm’s six-year tenure in Ames were strong, yielding three trips to the NCAA tourney and two Big 12 Conference Tournament titles. However, the final two seasons went bad, as Prohm went 14-44 and got pink-slipped.
After sitting out last season, Prohm got the nod to return to the sight of his early success after Matt McMahon exited Murray State for LSU. With Murray State moving up the conference food chain to the Missouri Valley Conference, Prohm’s attempt to recreate his past success with the Racers will be a challenge.
8. A home-state hero returns . The most decorated Kentucky high school girls’ basketball player since Makayla Epps, ex-Ryle star Maddie Scherr broke the hearts of UK recruiters when she took her ample hoops résumé — two-time Gatorade Kentucky Player of the Year; 2019 State Tournament MVP and state champion; 2020 Kentucky Miss Basketball; 2020 McDonald’s All-American — to Oregon.
After two seasons in Eugene, however, Scherr came home. The versatile 5-11 guard is expected to be one of the cornerstones as UK moves into the post-Rhyne Howard era.
7. EKU’s fresh start . Injuries sabotaged Eastern Kentucky men’s basketball’s debut season in the ASUN Conference (13-18, 5-11), but irrepressible Colonels head man A.W. Hamilton did not flinch. Going to work on the recruiting trail, Hamilton inked a class that 24/7 Sports ranked No. 65 in the country, ahead of such major programs as Connecticut (No. 73), Arizona (No. 83) and Gonzaga (No. 90).
Watch out for freshmen guards Tayshawn Comer and Leland Walker, a pair of highly regarded Indianapolis products. Also joining the EKU roster are the 2022 Kentucky Mr. Basketball, Turner Buttry of Bowling Green, and ex-Madison Central star Isaiah Cozart, a 6-8 big man who transferred home from Western Kentucky.
6. NKU’s ‘Kentucky proud’ backcourt . No one has to sell Northern Kentucky men’s coach Darrin Horn on the value of in-state recruiting. The former Tates Creek High School star needs only look to his guard station to see what homegrown talent can do.
Kentucky 2018 Mr. Basketball and former Mercer County star Trevon Faulkner (11.8 points, 4.9 rebounds last season for the Norse); ex-Henry Clay star Marques Warrick (16.8 points); and 2021 State Tournament MVP and ex-Highlands star Sam Vinson (11.2 points, 3.4 assists) are a big reason Northern Kentucky has been tabbed co-favorite (with Purdue Fort Wayne) to win the Horizon League.
5. U of L’s fresh start . In what has been an era of bad feelings for Louisville men’s basketball, the installation of U of L alum Kenny Payne as the Cardinals’ head man represents a chance for a needed turn of the page.
A reserve forward on Denny Crum’s 1986 NCAA championship team and a 1,000-point career scorer at U of L (1,083 points from 1985-89), Payne will be the fifth Louisville head coach — three full-time and two interim — since 2016-17.
Whether Payne can generate program momentum with a fast start in 2022-23 is very much open to question, especially after the Cardinals were beaten 57-47 in their first exhibition by NCAA Division II Lenoir-Rhyne.
4. A brand new team . After a wild Kentucky women’s basketball season in 2021-22 in which an injury-filled slog gave way to a 10-game, late-season win streak that featured an upset of No. 1 South Carolina in the SEC Tournament finals, Coach Kyra Elzy saw generational star Rhyne Howard graduate to the WNBA and four other key players leave via the transfer portal.
Undaunted, Elzy went to work and brought in 10 new players — six high school recruits and four transfers. The 10 newcomers will join with five returnees to give Kentucky, essentially, a brand new team for 2022-23. What to expect from the UK coach’s new roster is one of the coming college hoops season’s more intriguing mysteries.
3. Oscar’s encore . How do you top a season in which you won every major national player of the year award? For Kentucky’s Oscar Tshiebwe, we are about to find out.
After a stellar campaign when Tshiebwe averaged 17.4 points, led the nation in rebounding (15.1) and set a new UK record with 28 double-doubles, the 6-9, 260-pound big man could have a hard time matching that level of production because he will be playing on a deeper, more talented UK team.
If, unlike 2021-22, greater balance means Tshiebwe is playing on a team that wins meaningful championships, one suspects the product of the Democratic Republic of Congo will be down with that.
2. National title or bust? The best NCAA Division I basketball program in Kentucky the past five years has been the Louisville women. Since 2017-18, Coach Jeff Walz’s Cardinals have gone 151-20 and advanced to two Final Fours and four Elite Eights (and, remember, there was no NCAA tourney in 2020).
Over his U of L tenure, Walz has taken the Cardinals to four Final Fours (2009, 2013, 2018 and 2022) and two national title games (2009, 2013). What Louisville has yet to do it cut down the nets as the national champion.
With a roster led by star guard Hailey Van Lith, returning post player Olivia Cochran and featuring high-profile transfers Chrislyn Carr (Syracuse) and Morgan Jones (Florida State), this could be the year Walz marches over the “championship threshold.”
1. Calipari strikes back? It has been a bad stretch for Kentucky men’s basketball coach John Calipari. Over the past five years, UK has won one SEC regular-season title (2019-20) and one SEC Tournament championship (2017-18). Two seasons ago, the Wildcats produced a 9-16 season, the worst in the modern history of a proud program.
Last year, Kentucky was ousted from the NCAA Tournament in its first game by No. 15-seed Saint Peter’s. By seeding, it was the worst loss in the Wildcats’ Big Dance history. If that weren’t enough, in 2021-22 Kentucky also surrendered the all-time college college hoops wins lead to Kansas and the all-time NCAA Tournament wins lead to North Carolina.
All of that is why there figures to be an especially motivated coach on the Kentucky sidelines in 2022-23. UK returns the reigning national player of the year, a veteran backcourt and welcomes a sneaky-good four-player recruiting class. Best of all, the current UK roster features length and athleticism that hearkens back to Calipari’s best Kentucky teams.
In 2023-23, our state’s biggest basketball story is whether Calipari and his program can “regain paradise.”
