Does Kentucky Have Another Title In Its Future?

Thu., April 4, 1996

Bud Withers Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Hardly had Kentucky players donned championship T-shirts and readjusted commemorative caps backwards Monday night, than the speculation began.

Can the Wildcats keep this thing going next year? Will the program retain Rick Pitino? Will a championship sate the urge for personal glory in budding stars like Antoine Walker and Ron Mercer, or will it cause them to figure Kentucky now owes them one and they want their 20 points a game?

“It’s always a monster,” mused Jim Boeheim, the Syracuse coach, referring to the Kentucky program. “Rick might be the only modern coach that can handle that job for this length of time.”

The length is now seven years, and popular wisdom says Pitino will cut and run for the right NBA job, something like the Celtics or possibly the Nets. Some believe he wants the distinction of coaching an NCAA and an NBA champion.

If he stays, Kentucky becomes as provocative for what lies next year as what happened in ‘96. Pitino would lose seniors Tony Delk, Walter McCarty and Mark Pope, but that leaves seven excellent players, redshirting forward Jared Prickett, and the Wildcats are in the running for two top recruits - 6-foot-10 Jermaine O’Neal of South Carolina and 6-9 Jamal Magliore of Toronto.

The question is chemistry, often a dicey proposition the year after a championship.

Outside the Kentucky commonwealth, the face of college basketball will turn, as usual, on the decisions of underclassmen regarding the NBA draft. At least nine programs are seriously affected: Massachusetts (Marcus Camby), Connecticut (Ray Allen), Wake Forest (Tim Duncan), Georgetown (Allen Iverson), Kansas (Jacque Vaughn), Cincinnati (Danny Fortson), Mississippi State (Erick Dampier), Utah (Keith Van Horn) and Georgia Tech (Stephon Marbury).

Camby, Duncan and Allen are considered near-certainties to come out, with Marbury announcing Wednesday. Iverson is thought to be staying for at least another year, and any team with him is dangerous.

If Camby, Duncan, and Allen are in the NBA next year, a pre-season top five might look something like this, depending on who’s coaching Kentucky: 1, Kentucky. 2, Kansas. 3, UCLA. 4, Georgetown. 5, Cincinnati.

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Does Kentucky Have Another Title In Its Future?

Jesse Tinsley

Jim Meehan

Molly Quinn

Rob Curley

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