After a decade and a half with Kentucky, former Wildcats head coach John Calipari is no longer leading the program. Now the head coach at Arkansas, the longtime face of the team brought a few of his former players to a new school in the SEC. In his absence, former BYU head coach Mark Pope is now running the show for Kentucky.

Just like 15 years ago, there’s a ton of excitement around this new era of UK basketball. But Mark Pope is walking into much tougher circumstances than John Calipari did.

The work begins for real for Kentucky coach Mark Pope, who was hired from BYU and given the challenging task of following Hall of Famer John Calipari after his departure to Arkansas after 15 years.