2026-03-04- KSR - Hour 2

It's the new me. And it's the old them. This Woman's History Month, the podcast, If You Knew Better with Amber Grimes, spotlights women who turn missteps into momentum and lessons into power. My like tunnel vision of like, I gotta achieve this was off the strengths of like, I wanna make a better life for us. If You Knew Better brings real talk from women who've lived it, unpacking career pivots, relationship lessons, and the mindset shifts that changed everything. Listen to If You Knew Better with Amber Grimes on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Talking to your kids about the dangers of vaping can be hard. Getting them to listen to hot gossip is easy. So here's some drama you could share with your kid. Dude, did you hear about Cassie and Jake? No, but did you hear that vaping can cause irreversible lung damage and nicotine affects brain development? Nuh-uh. You don't need to gossip if you want to have an open conversation about vaping. So if you want to get tips on when and how to talk to your kids, visit talkaboutvaping.org. Brought to you by the American Lung Association and the Ad Council. the iHeartRadio app, or wherever you get your podcasts. The human body is a beautiful machine, and keeping it running means understanding how it actually works. Which is why this podcast will kill you is doing a multi-part series on sleep. What it's for, why our bodies don't follow neat rules, and why modern life is not helping. When you consider what we know about sleep in humans, there's one rule that comes out. We are predictably unpredictable sleepers. We'll continue exploring how the body works with a multi-part series on digestive function. So listen to our newest series, which runs January 20th through February 17th with new episodes every Tuesday. From the Exactly Right Network, listen to This Podcast Will Kill You on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Looking for a mortgage bank to help you make your next major mortgage move? Whether it's a refi or home purchase, regardless of whether it's your first one or one of many, consider our friends at Stockton Mortgage. But don't just take our word for it. Stockton Mortgage has over 70,000 five-star reviews and counting. Just like this review from Joshua who says this about his experience with Stockton. They were super professional, always answered my questions I had and streamlined the process. I could not ask for better people to help me and my family get our first house. I feel blessed to be able to go through them. Be like Joshua or the 69,999 others just like him and get started with Stockton Mortgage today by going to Stockton.com and get started. I've even used Stockton Mortgage myself on my own home loan. For your home loan needs, Stockton.com and click Get Started. Stockton Mortgage, NMLS 8259, Equal Housing Lender, NMLSConsumerAccess.org. Welcome to Hour 2 of Kentucky Sports Radio presented by Stockton Mortgage. Now, here's Matt Jones. Welcome back. Hour number 2, Kentucky Sports Radio, 859-280-2287. We are here at the KS Bar and Grill, open for lunch now. It is Wings Day, Dollar Wings. You excited about that? Yes. I'm excited about actually watching the women play today here. Yes, the women are starting right now, and they're shooting a three, and they're making a three as they lead 6-0 to start the game against Arkansas. Arkansas 1-15 in conference, Drew, so hopefully we can get that victory. You don't love being the first game of the tournament, but you can get an extra game playing a team that you should be able to handle. So careful not to cast our curse here, but Arkansas had a rough year. All right, I have two things that got a little under the radar yesterday I want to know. Let's start with Lee Todd, former U.K. president, was interviewed. I thought he had some interesting stuff to say. He was asked about the hiring of John Calipari back in the day. And he said, and this is the first time I've ever heard someone say this, that Mitch Barnhart came to him after Tubby left and said he wanted to hire John Calipari. And Lee Todd said, no, I don't want you to. We can't risk the scandal. And so they ended up with Billy. And then two years later, of course, that didn't work. He says Barnhart went to Lee Todd and said, please, why don't you at least come and talk to Cal? and in those few hours Cal won Lee Todd over. That's really not what people have thought for a long time. Do you think Lee Todd is doing Mitch a solid or do you think that's what happened? Never heard this story until Lee Todd said it. I think he's falling on the sword to kind of honor Mitch a little more on his retirement. I don't know why he's waited 25 years to do it. I mean, I do think it is true. there's been this idea for a long time that Mitch didn't want to hire Cal and Mike Pratt made him and all that. I've always thought that was not true because I know it's not true. I was communicating a lot with Mike Pratt during that hiring process, and while Cal was his favorite choice, he said at the time that they basically had to convince Lee Todd. What I had never heard was that Mitch wanted to hire Cal the first time. I mean Lee knows better than I do and I think Lee's an honest man but I had never heard that neither and I'd heard the opposite a thousand times uh it kind of makes you wonder why Lee didn't get out in front of this as Mitch that was the narrative for I mean 20 years yeah I guess it's nice of him to say it if that's really how it went down on the day uh Mitch is being talked about and celebrated in his retirement so let's talk about what Cal says someone read to me You know, John Calipari, maybe you don't want John Calipari to do your eulogy in life with his congratulations tweet to Mitch yesterday. Read for me, Drew, Calipari's farewell tweet to Mitch Barnhart. Do we need some soft music or anything? No, I think you're good, yeah. I just heard that Mitch Barnhart is retiring. I wanted to say, even though Mitch and I didn't always see eye to eye, he did a good job, and I wish he and Connie well in retirement. I mean, Shannon, that's not exactly the most glowing endorsement ever, is it? I was waiting for Drew to continue. That's it. That's all. Two sentences, is that it, or one sentence? The next tweet is about the new Tyson patch on their jerseys. That's all. That's all you get. Even though Mitch and I didn't see eye to eye, I like that he felt like he needed to say that immediately. The fact that it's so brief tells you all you need to know about the relationship. If that were somebody he likes, that would be three or four tweets long. I give John Calipari a lot of credit. That's an honest tweet. It is. That sums up their relationship. It does. You know what? I don't really like him, but I hope he's happy. You did a good job. I hope him and Connie can be happy. I hope him and Connie find happiness. I thought he could have gone like so many great memories, New Orleans 2012, the work we did, the great success we had. No, we didn't see that. Good luck, man. Good luck with your initiative. Yeah. You know what? You were good. Hope things go well for you. So when Cal was here, we all knew there was somebody else kind of running his Twitter account. It's obvious now. I think he wrote that one. I think he wrote that one. Yep. I think he wrote that one. That was the one that has his fingerprints all over it. I don't think that was the Arkansas media director. I think he wrote that one. You know, when he was here, I would say all the time, Mitch and Cal don't like each other, and people used to write me and go, why do you say that? You don't know that, Matt Jones. Well, if you ever thought I was not telling the truth, just go back and look at that tweet. How many times do we have to hear you are causing drama that doesn't exist or trying to stir up trouble? No, that was their relationship. And I think when I hang up my boots, my radio boots, if I did it today, the two craziest memories to me, number one will always be Billy Gillespie being chased by Alan Cutler and that day when they couldn't find him in Lexington and he was driving around New Circle Road trying to hide from getting fired. But number two, I think, is the day of John Calipari walking his dog out on the street and that interview with Mitch where they both sit there with the WWF belt behind them awkwardly trying to act like they're friends. Like they're buddy-buddy, and we're going to run it back one more time. We're in it together. We're on board. We both agree with everything. We're a team now. What a weird ending for those years when basketball wasn't going well. And nobody watching at home was believing a single word they were saying. And if you don't want to know why, the reason you shouldn't have believed it is, two days later he was gone. They did that interview on a Tuesday, and by Thursday he was on his way to Arkansas. I had a little bit of sympathy for Mitch on that one. I did too. I think Cal lied to Mitch there. Yeah. That was – Cal lied to Mitch, said it was good, and then was talking to Arkansas. That's – that was poor form by Cal. It helped us, though, so I'm glad it happened. Yeah. All right, next thing. Hardley Gilmore. The Hardley Gilmore thing is one of the great, hilarious stories. So, Hardley Gilmore is coming back to Kentucky for the third time in 15 months. Pretty hard to do. This is an amazing timeline. I'm going to read you the Hardly Gilmore timeline. December 28, 2024, Hardly Gilmore leaves Kentucky and enters the portal. Okay? So that means on December 27, he was here. January 1, 2025, he commits to Nebraska. April 16, 2025, leaves Nebraska and enters the portal again. So he was at Nebraska for three months. On April 17th, he returns to Kentucky. Plays for Kentucky. On January 7th, he enters the transfer portal again, leaving Kentucky for a second time. Commits to Louisville on January 8th. On January 12th, leaves Louisville after four days. Four days. Commits to Baylor on January 12th of this year, and now on March 3rd, decommits from Baylor and is back to Kentucky again. He has, in 15 months, played for Kentucky, Nebraska, Kentucky, Louisville, Baylor, and now back to Kentucky. That's the craziest resume I've ever seen. And it should have been in that short amount of time, in a little over one year's time. I don't know how the kid, how you maintain any eligibility at all. This day and age, you transfer back and forth in a week. That doesn't smell right. You know, they say third time's a charm. This time I think he sticks. He's no longer going to be hardly Gilmore. He's going to be fully Gilmore with Kentucky, and he's going to have a good – I know that Will Stein wanted to keep him. He just – remember when we talked about what Will Stein thought about receivers? He was like, I'm only paying a lot of money for a stud, and if you're not a stud, I think hardly Gilmore was one of those. He was like, I'd like to have you, but I'm going to pay you a certain amount of money, and if you can get something else somewhere else, then do it. Yeah, his poor guidance counselor and academic advisor has been in hell lately with these transcripts. You think Mitch is going to be working with him in the sports? That could be part of it. I guess you could say, well, my man, he loves Lexington. Even though he likes to look around, he always comes back home. I'd use this in a recruiting pamphlet. Like, look, this dude went to Nebraska, enrolled and was in the locker room and ran back. Goes to Baylor, went around, ran back. I like that he was at Louisville for four days. That's really funny to me. Yeah, that's when Vince got like four or five of our guys. Hardly stays for a couple days. I'm out. Not what I thought. But I actually think he'll play. I do think he'll play this year. I actually think he'll be helpful for us. And if you remember, we've talked about receivers, the one position where we were a little thin. So I actually think Kentucky's probably happy about this. Well, last year when Bowley got it going a little bit there towards the end of the year, won a few games. Part of it was he started throwing it to Gilmore a lot. I think he had a couple games with five or six receptions there towards the end. Yeah, he definitely had some moments last year where you thought, okay, this guy could really be a big-time receiver. at some point. So welcome back, Harley Gilmore. I know you'll probably be gone in a few months, but then we will welcome you back again when the season starts. If he leaves again, just say all right see you man Leave everything right where it is Don take his nameplate off the locker He be back Don change any paperwork Just let him have his moment He come back He be back The boomerang Who up next Shannon Adam. Adam. Go ahead, Adam. Hey, what's up, guys? Happy trails to Dave Baker. Matt, does this open up the door for you to go back on the pregame show? I think that's very unlikely that they'll put me on the pregame show. But, you know, I did it for a couple years. I enjoyed it. I, you know, Dave preceded me in a lot of success. I preceded Dave in being let go by the UK broadcasting. Oh, yeah, I've listened to Dave for a long time. I'd hate to see him go. But also, so you've given us the candidates of replacement and who you think is most likely. And your opinion, who would you want to see? I know that's a loaded question. Yeah, I mean, well, Dwayne is my friend. And I was thinking on my drive here this morning because on a personal level, I want Dwayne because he's my friend and you root for your friend. I also think objectively, Dwayne is the best at checking all the boxes this job needs. Is Dwayne a perfect candidate? No, because of the football piece. Now, DePaul is starting to turn it around, but it took a couple years. But I kind of know what he was dealing with there. And so I actually think his early struggles, I understand. So Dwayne to me is number one, but I acknowledge that I have bias. So if I say Dwayne's one, for me he's one. Second would be what Drew said. You've got to go ask Rob Mullins to say no. And maybe even you do that first. And then I think you're looking at, you know, after that for me, it would probably be Strickland would be my top three. The thing is, Dwayne will say yes. So if you ask him, he'll be the AD. But, yeah, I would say for me, Dwayne, Rob Mullins, and Scott Strickland would be my top choices. And I like Martin Newton, too. I hadn't really thought of that. He's a little older, though. He won't have the job as long as some of these other guys might. And Sanford's not Oregon, Alabama, or Florida, but he has had a lot of success there, and we all know his history in this town. Yeah, and I appreciate the call. I think it's very important. Kentucky athletics is tied to a handful of donors in a way other programs aren't. And I just think it's very important you have somebody with a connection to those people. It doesn't mean they run the program. It just means, practically speaking, you've got to be able to do that. You know, when Dwayne left here to take the AD job at DePaul, I think we all thought at the time he's doing this just to groom himself, getting himself groomed for the U.K. job when Mitch Barnhart retires. If the John Calipari era had not ended the way it was and Cal was still the coach here, Dwayne would be the next AD because Dwayne and Cal had a great relationship. But the Calipari era ending led to a different situation. And, you know, part of that was Dwayne needed to go prove himself somewhere, and the hope was probably Cal still would be here when this door opened. It just didn't work out that way on the calendar. 859-280-2287. Kentucky women lead 16-7 against Arkansas. We will take a break. Take a call. People have got their wings. That smells really good. Hope it tastes as good as it smells. We'll take a break. Be right back. This is Kentucky Sports Radio. This is Ryder Strong with a podcast called The Red Weather. In 1995, my neighbor, Anna Traynor, disappeared from a commune. It was nature and trees and praying and drugs. So no, I am not your guru. Back then, I lied to everybody. They have had this case for 30 years. I'm going back to my hometown to uncover the truth. You can now binge all episodes of The Red Weather on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. A ambitious, well-intentioned, ferocious, and wealthy mother looks like in the Black community. This Women's History Month, the podcast Keep It Positive, Sweetie celebrates the power of women choosing healing, purpose, and faith, even when life gets messy. Love is not a destination. You have to work on it every day. Keep It Positive, Sweetie creates space for honest conversations on self-worth, love, growth, and navigating life with grace and grit, led by women who uplift, inspire, and tell the truth out loud. I have several conversations with God and I know why it took 20 years. To hear this and more, listen to Keep It Positive, Sweetie, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Ever feel like you're being chased by the marriage police? Welcome to Boys and Girls, the podcast where dating isn't dating. Arranged marriage is basically a reality show, except the contestants are strangers and your entire family is judging. You're sipping coffee with one maybe, grabbing dinner with another, and praying your karmic Ken or Barbie appears before your shelf life runs out. Trust me, I've been through this ancient and unshakable tradition. I jumped in, hoping to find love the right way, and instead I found chaos, cringe and comedy. And now, I'm looking for healing. Boys and Girls dives into every twist and turn of the arranged marriage carousel. The meet awkward, the near misses, the heartbreak, and let's not forget all the jokes. Listen to Boys and Girls on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. It's the new me. And it's the old them. Everybody's on their journey. And your journey's different to theirs. This Woman's History Month, the podcast, If You Knew Better with Amber Grimes, spotlights women who turn missteps into momentum and lessons into power. I think coming out of where I came from, I'm from the Bronx. I think I grew up really poor. I didn't know that then because I very much use my creativity to romanticize life. And I'm like, my mom did a really good job of like, you step back and you're like, whoa, we, I don't know how we made it. So a lot of my life was like built out of like survival to get to the next place. Like my drive, my like tunnel vision of like, I got to be better. I got to achieve this was off the strengths of like, I want to make a better life for us. If You Knew Better brings real talk from women who've lived it. Unpacking career pivots, relationship lessons, and the mindset shifts that changed everything. Listen to If You Knew Better with Amber Grimes on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back, Kentucky Sports Radio. Kentucky, Mark Pope is in, at least according to this dude who covers Delaware basketball, which that is a niche. If your thing is I'm going to cover Delaware basketball, because Delaware is not a very big state. No. He covers Delaware basketball. He says that Mark Pope is in Philadelphia today to watch Dink Pate of the G League, the Westchester Knicks, play to potentially play college basketball next year. Dink Pate would be, I think, a good addition for us next year. Everything you read is the kid can score, and I'd be for it. Would you? Heck, yeah. I mean, we'll see what goes into the portal. That still has to shape itself out, but they need something at this point. If you're not going to get a freshman, yeah, go to the G League. I mean, I don't love the chaos that is recruiting right now, but go get the best player you can find. My guy won last night. Delmonico? Talrico. We were joking about this as well. Can I say what happened to me? About what? We were talking about his name. Oh, yeah. And on my phone, I have a text message show up from his campaign wanting donations today. The fact that our phones listen to us like that is crazy. Wait a minute. So you got a thing asking for a donation? And you don't even know who he is. Didn't even know who he was. I just happened to ask you. I said, hey, did your guy win last night, Delmonico? You said, I'll tell a little Rico. Tell a Rico. And then I'll get my phone, and I have a text message from his campaign wanting a one-day donation. Yeah. Well, he won. Made me very happy. Here's what I would say. I posted about it, and, of course, the online trolls start yelling at me. If you're interested in, like, why I like this person, like I think a lot of you are sincere, go watch his interview with Joe Rogan. It's like two and a half hours. And if I were to articulate sort of my views, he probably does it better than I could articulate it myself. So James Tallarico, he won the primary yesterday. I was a little surprised because I didn't think guys like him could win a Democratic primary, but he did. So I may disappear to Texas and go volunteer. Well, so you said you're going to volunteer for his campaign. Why don't they text you for that information? I told him to text you that you had the money. Take Ryan with you. You going to donate? TSR, Texas Sports Radio. Who's up first, Shannon? Tate. Tate. Go ahead, Tate. Hey, guys. Love you, but I had to call in and make one correction. Obviously, last night was not excusable. Pope had some issues. But he actually did call a timeout during that run, like the 419 mark. Yeah, after they had already taken the lead. after they had already taken the lead. So he called a timeout. We were up 12, and they, I think, grabbed the lead by two, and then he called a timeout. So, I mean, he did not stop the run until after. Yeah, it's whenever they took the lead by one. Yeah. That's only a 13-point run. But that's a 13-0 run. It has been said that he. But that's a 13-0 run. Yeah, but the talk is that he didn't call a timeout the entire first half, which is just false. Well, we never said that. Hang on. He needed to call a timeout. That stands. Nobody said he didn't call a timeout the whole half. I mean, are you trying to act like that was a reason? Matt absolutely said that last night on the postgame show. Okay, but that did – okay, fine. If I said that, I don't remember saying that, then I was incorrect. But the point of he didn't call a timeout – I mean, your tweet even said that, like, he had one that he would lose at halftime. He did, and that's why I think he – No, he didn't. He had – when he didn't call a timeout – He called a timeout. When he didn't call a timeout during the 13-0 run, he had a timeout that he would have lost. Now, you're saying he called it after the run. Fair enough. And if I said he didn't, then I was incorrect. But my point was during the 13-0 run that changed the game, he did not call a timeout. And I'm right about that. Yeah, I mean, he called it at the end of the 13-0 run. Which is too late. We're losing at that point. And there was still a much larger, like 23, 30 point. Yes, and we did not come out of the timeout. It was maybe too late. That was my point. I appreciate the call. I was screaming at my TV to call a timeout, so I know that happened. I wasn't going crazy. I was yelling, get a timeout. Now, it is fair to say after that break we didn't come out and play any better. I mean, that's completely correct. I mean, we gave a 36-6 run. It's just ridiculous. Any coach in that situation looking to stop the bleeding, especially when you're on the road, call a timeout so the crowd quiets down, they lose their momentum, it just didn't have it. Can I pay a compliment to the staff in the first half? Yeah. We got the best challenge guy, Matt Santorina. I need to look up his name. I might have gotten that wrong. But our challenge guy that sits behind Pope, he did it again. He's unbelievable. Give him the million Mitch's gift. So is he the one that says challenge? He sits there and he makes the call. I don't know his record this year, but I'm going to say he's 100%. But he did it again last night. Didn't matter, obviously. But that was a big move early in the game when he challenged. And just more credit to him because that's his role back there. Part of what's so frustrating is they came out so well early. Not only did they score, but they got ahead of the defense, got a bunch of dunks. They were so good early, and then it's just like it completely collapsed. They got that lead, and they almost put it in cruise control, and he played the bench and played the wrong combination of guys. And they also didn't hustle nearly as much. The effort in the first half, those last eight minutes, was poor. It was. And that's what we saw in that run. That is their style. That is what you have to avoid. And that's why I wanted to time out, because you could see it happening where they're creating the chaos, Kentucky's throwing it to nobody, and A&M is running and gunning. That's why I'm sure he called one after a 13-0 run, but you've got to cut that off immediately because that's where they thrive. You know, Mark Pope has said all year, obviously at the beginning of the year, he said, I have a Ferrari and we're going to be successful. But even throughout struggles this year, he has come back and been like, we're going to do something special. You know, like he is – that has kind of stopped because they're running out of time. but you get the sense that he really felt like this was going to work this year. And so it has felt like to me he's never quite connected with this group because I think he kept feeling like it's going to happen. And they've won some games, but it just hasn't happened yet. He saw the performance that we got against Vanderbilt last weekend. That the Ferrari he thought he was going to get Do you think we come out and play well against Florida I do by the way Probably I think we come out I don know if we can win but I bet that game is very close I agree We played Florida actually pretty well down there Their big didn't hurt us. It was their backcourt guys that hurt us. Yeah. Who's next? Let's go to Joe. Joe. Go ahead, Joe. Hey, Matt. Does losing – is it just me or does losing to Bucky hurt worse than like losing to Jason, Tom, or Jerome? home you don't like losing the guys named bucky yeah bucky's an odd name you don't hear a lot of bucky's that just ate me up all night but um i hadn't thought of it until just now uh one of the biggest sports talk advertisers the last like whatever 10 years is that manscaper and the way ryan said that duane was grooming himself and his wild eggs work i think this is a match made in heaven yeah i think ryan would be a good manscaper um advertiser they should look into you for that it feels like that one's that one really is connected to you i'm willing to volunteer and do a live demonstration if we need to um so you know i had something to say oh bucky bucky people don't name their kids bucky do they is their name like what is the name they love them What is the name that leads to Bucky being what they're called? Is it Buck? He's a Henry. So how do Henrys turn into Bucky's? Well, there was a Buck Henry, a Hall of Fame baseball player. Maybe his name is Henry. Maybe they started calling him Buck Henry. But in general, where does the name Buck come from? How do you – like, you know, what, Jack will come from John. But do people name their kids Bucky? I don't know a Bucky. I don't know where they come from, how it starts. It's an odd name to start, look at your child come out and go, that's a Bucky. I'll be right back. TJ Smith, personal injury attorney. Call TJ. He'll make them pay. Now, more of Kentucky Sports Radio presented by Stockton Mortgage. Here's Matt Jones. Welcome back. Kentucky Sports Radio, 859-280-2287. Todd is very upset. Todd? Todd writes, if you're going to have a radio show that allows folks to call in and talk, then don't keep people on hold while your crew rambles about multiple topics. Pick a topic for an hour. Give your take. Shut up and take calls. Wow. Was that Todd from yesterday that changed his name from Michael? I don't know. Todd very upset, though. Michael would be a lot nicer than Todd. Todd very upset. You must be new to this show because this show is basically us rambling about multiple topics. I mean, that is the show. Long time of that. A lot of mornings of doing that. Post-game show, it's me rambling and then letting you take your calls. What about having six guys on the court? I like the effort. Got to try something. Nothing else is working. How did they not catch that? I don't know. Bucky was right. He was upset. He was right. He showed the screen. and there were six guys out there getting ready to shoot a free throw. And that's what was crazy was dead action, and they didn't see six guys out there. What if we had won because of that? It would be awesome. But I noticed in the Vandy game last night, Shannon, they went back in time. Did you see that? And called a flagrant on a play that had happened like two plays before? Yeah, yeah. I didn't know you could do that. Did you? No. I guess they're making it up as we go. I've never seen that called. It was a key point in the game. They went backwards a couple plays and were like, yeah, that was a flagrant a couple plays ago. Came down to the wire there. In our game with the six players, I get a little annoyed by the short bench complaints, but if we're going to play six guys at one time, I do think you're hurting your bench there and your fatigue if you're running out more guys than you need to. Yeah, it was, you know, you talked about Pope not liking the Saturday, Tuesday. What's he going to feel in the SEC tournament when we play Wednesday, Thursday, Friday? I mean, that's going to be hard. We're playing Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday? All right, I'm back in now. You're talking me into some stuff now. Yeah, also the Wednesday to Saturday turnaround is the same thing. Like there's seven days in a week. If two days are game days, it is impossible to have three days off between every game. That is true. Wednesday, Saturday is the exact same thing. You're going to have a two-day gap between games, so you have to. It's just a really, really bad argument that he's trying to say fatigue is hurting his team. You and I are going with Mario to, well, first of all, it is the Wild Eggs Wednesday. Yes. Wild Eggs is your best spot for breakfast and brunch. And Wild Eggs is not just about Ryan's ads. It's also about good food. It's Wild Eggs Wednesday. Our Wild Eggs word of the day, which will get you a $50 gift card from Wild Eggs, is now being sent out on the KSR TikTok. Ryan picked the word. Oh, no. Have you just put it up? I got to look at this. All right, I got to see what you put up. Okay. If Ryan picked the word, there's no way this is not. And first response that is correct wins. Oh, my goodness, that's a lot of letters. Yeah. Mommy squammy. Oh, that's a good one. Is this one word? This is not one word, right? That's one word. I haven't gotten to it yet. I have no idea what that is. That's not one word. Yeah. You found a word with 14 letters? Oh. No, that's not it. Shannon, do you know what it is? Are you looking at it? I'm trying to find it here. Unforgettable. I got it one second. Oh, sorry. This is two days in a row. Drew, this is two days in a row. When did you become Ryan with diarrhea at the mouth? I just pulled it up and it jumped right out at me. This is two days in a row that you have just completely dropped. What are you doing? I got it at first sight. It doesn't matter. It's a game. I understand. Did you drop it, Shannon? No. Well, pick harder ones. No, just have mouth control. Also, somebody already got it. He dropped the Middlesbrough thing yesterday. It's on social media. You'll be fine. Pick harder words. All I did was look at it. Mouth control. He doesn't have mouth control. That's next week's scrambled word, mouth control. Yeah, mouth control. Tom, there's your word drop at the SEC tournament, mouth control. That was easy. Drew doesn't have it. Can you? By the way, we are going tomorrow to Middlesboro. It was supposed to be a surprise. Drew dropped it during the show. I just get excited. And then Shannon left it on the podcast, so I blame both of you. You forgot to remind me. I blame you. Here's the reason we're doing it. I wanted it to be a surprise for everybody else. I really – so we'll talk about this more tomorrow. We got a fairly positive report about my dad, and I wanted to take the show and go spend the show with my – we're going to do a show in front of my parents tomorrow. So Ryan, Drew, and Mario and I are going to Middlesbrough and doing the show there tomorrow. I didn't want to, like, say it because it's not a remote. We're just going to be at our house. But people have asked for a long time, and I appreciate it. Everybody comes up and asks me about my dad. He, you know, still has a long road ahead, but it's a more positive situation than it was a couple months ago, and so we wanted to go kind of celebrate with him and go down there. So it was supposed to be a surprise that Drew ruined, but that's what we're – It's going to be unforgettable. That's what we're doing tomorrow. Larry's one of our favorite guys. We admire and respect that man and what he's going through right now. So, yeah, we just wanted to give him his flowers tomorrow. By the way, people got it right, Shannon, once Drew said it. They were able to actually get it correct. I didn't even have a chance to pull up the word. You didn't see it scrambled. I took longer finding TikTok than I did getting the word. Unbelievable. Who's next? Craig. Craig. Go ahead, Craig. Hey, bless your dad. That's good news. I just wanted to say I think last night was probably the most disheartening loss that Pope has had since he's been here just because, you know, Gave up 90-plus in March. The timeout, same thing. Substitution, same things. And, you know, we could make excuses for it. He didn't really get worked by John Wooden out there. I mean, it was just rough to watch. But I wanted to get your thoughts. I think a lot of times your first reaction is your best reaction. And I know looking back from all the hires from when I was a kid, I can remember the first one was Eddie Sutton. I wasn't that excited, but everybody tries to talk himself into it. Turned out poorly. I thought it was a home run with Patino. It was. Tubby's the only one where I wasn't that excited. It turned out to be a really good coach, I thought. Billy, gee, wasn't excited. Didn't understand how this guy, you know, got the job. Turned out poorly. I was fired up for Cal. And then I think most people, as much as we try to talk ourselves into Pope, when he was hired, it was lukewarm at best from everybody. And I think, you know, I hate it, but I don't – We'll see. We'll see. I don't think it's going to work. Well, and you might be right. We'll see. But I also – I appreciate the call. I'm not ready to give up yet at all. I mean, I am discouraged. But as I said last night, I don't think it's – I don't think Pope doesn't know how to coach. I don't think he doesn't know how to motivate. I don't think he – I'm worried about getting players. But I don't think he is somehow not good at his job. But I also get very frustrated. I think he is, I've decided, in my mind, he is the computer engineer who believes whatever the computer says is correct, even if the inputs are not correct and you're getting a weird answer. He reminds me of the people on Twitter that will just ask, grok, everything. And whatever it says, it assumes what has to be correct, it said it. that's how I think Pope is with these analytics. It's like it tells me to take out Aberdeen. I have to. Yeah, but, you know, Mark, Aberdeen is the only guy that we have that can dribble it up the floor. Well, I'm taking him out. I love analytics in basketball. You need them. But your eyeballs should be the final say. And if a guy is just not out there giving his best or when he's missing shots, he's wide right, clanking it off the backboard, you need to put the analytics aside. and maybe he's not bringing what the analytics thought he would that night, or maybe you have a guy who you didn't expect to play well is on fire. You just kind of got to ride that wave and trust what's happening right in front of you. What do you think about Garrison throwing that ball in the guy's face? I predicted that Garrison would have a fight or a technical at some point during that game yesterday. Yes, you did. And I thought that was going to be it. I thought he was going to hit that guy, and they're going to get up, and they're going to have a fight. I kind of like it. We need somebody like that. Neither Jamal McGlore guy that's not afraid to push people around. He just needs to do it more often. I don't know if he needs to take two threes. No. Take that out of your repertoire. It's a good move, though. I like what he did. Kind of trolls him a little bit. Although, he might have had a little four on five if he could have thrown it out and got going. But still, I like the guy laying at your feet. Just give him the old Josh Harrelson and Jared Solinger spike. How could he be 6'11 and miss a bunny layup right in front of him? And he does that quite a bit. He does that quite a bit. Kentucky was up 20 in this game against Arkansas. It has now been cut to nine. The Kentucky women lead 42-33 here with just about 30 seconds left in the first half. We'll take a break. 8-5-9, 2-8-0, 22-87. Hopefully, Drew will spoil more surprises. Oh, no, curveball. That's not the word. It's not the word? No, it doesn't fit. That's not the word. That's what people keep telling me online. There's too many Ts. Oh, wait a minute. Hang on. No, wait a minute. I gave a fake word. No, apparently it is unfair. You spelled it wrong, didn't you, Ryan? I didn't post it on the graphic. There are too many T's, so my answer is incorrect. Hang on just a second. I was throwing people off. Unfor, yeah. You spelled unforgettable wrong. I didn't put it on the graphic. Unforgettable lust. I'm just glad the heat's off me. You spelled unforgettable wrong. It wasn't me. Also, he just copied and pasted what I sent him, he said. You copied and pasted what he said. So there are three T's on here. Eliminates unforgettable. My name is out of this. But what did you intend the word to be? Unforgettables. So, unforgettables. There's no S in your word. Look. Unforgettables? I sent him a word. There's spell check. There's all kind of things you can put on there. Let me see what you sent him. Right there. Unforgettables. That's exactly what I sent him. Yeah, that's on you, Mario. You put three T's and no S. Wow, what a crew we got here. Look at this crew I deal with, Shannon. I mean, wow. I got Ryan who the first time took two words I got Drew just blurting out the answer Not the answer And Mario misspelling everything Can we count this person They said ton forgettable I think we should just count it Next week, can we just make the word cat? Yeah. You know? We can screw that up. The Wild Eggs Wednesday, like everything we do, a disaster. Perfect. We'll take a break. Be right back. This is Ryder Strong with a podcast called The Red Weather. In 1995, my neighbor, Anna Traynor, disappeared from a commune. It was nature and trees and praying and drugs. No, I am not your guru. Back then, I lied to everybody. They have had this case for 30 years. I'm going back to my hometown to uncover the truth. You can now binge all episodes of The Red Weather on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. An ambitious, well-intentioned, ferocious, and wealthy mother looks like in the Black community. This Women's History Month, the podcast Keep It Positive, Sweetie, celebrates the power of women choosing healing, purpose, and faith, even when life gets messy. Love is not a destination. You have to work on it every day. Keep It Positive, Sweetie creates space for honest conversations on self-worth, love, growth, and navigating life with grace and grit, led by women who uplift, inspire, and tell the truth out loud. I have several conversations with God and I know why it took 20 years. To hear this and more, listen to Keep It Positive, Sweetie, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Ever feel like you're being chased by the marriage police? Welcome to Boys and Girls, the podcast where dating isn't dating. Arranged marriage is basically a reality show, except the contestants are strangers and your entire family is judging. You're sipping coffee with one maybe, grabbing dinner with another, and praying your karmic Ken or Barbie appears before your shelf life runs out. Trust me, I've been through this ancient and unshakable tradition. I jumped in, hoping to find love the right way, and instead I found chaos, cringe and comedy. And now I'm looking for healing. Boys and Girls dives into every twist and turn of the arranged marriage carousel. The meet awkward, the near misses, the heartbreak, and let's not forget all the jokes. Listen to Boys and Girls on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. It's the new me. And it's the old them. Everybody's on their journey. And your journey's different to theirs. This Women's History Month, the podcast, If You Knew Better with Amber Grimes, spotlights women who turn missteps into momentum and lessons into power. I think coming out of where I came from, I'm from the Bronx. I think I grew up really poor. I didn't know that then because I very much use my creativity to romanticize life. And I'm like, my mom did a really good job of like, you step back and you're like, whoa, we, I don't know how we made it. So a lot of my life was like built out of like survival to get to the next place. Like my drive, my like tunnel vision of like, I got to be better. I got to achieve this was off the strengths of like, I want to make a better life for us. If You Knew Better brings real talk from women who've lived it, unpacking career pivots, relationship lessons, and the mindset shifts that changed everything. Listen to If You Knew Better with Amber Grimes on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome back to Tuggy Sports Radio. 859-280-2287. On the text machine, one person writes, Matt, why did you do that when on TikTok I don't have TikTok? Exactly. It's to try to get you to follow our TikTok. There's a method to this madness. I didn't fall off the turnip truck yesterday. We do it on the different social media accounts, so then you follow and we grow the social media accounts. It's marketing. Dun, dun, dun. Right? Yes. That's what you're trying to do with this. We're spreading it out. I mean, our TikTok account, we didn't even have a TikTok account when we hired Mario. And now it has 42,800 people. And he built that from nothing. And it made a huge impact. College students in that area, in like high school, college, a little bit out of college, they know us now. from tiktok i meet people all the time who are like you're the guy from tiktok which is weird to me but you know the reason we hired mario is i started to notice that like we weren't as big from like 20 to 27 year olds as we used to be and i'm getting older so how are we going to do it and that it has worked extremely well so like that's the whole point you do facebook for the older people, Twitter for people my age, Instagram for like eight to ten years younger than me, and then TikTok for younger than that. And then there'll be something else, flip-flab or something, and we'll have to put it on there too. Are we on Blue Sky next week? I can't do Blue Sky. I tried because I was like, this is where my political people are, and I can't. It's awful. I wouldn't be on Twitter either except we have to for sports. Instagram is my I think that's the right place for me Maybe TikTok Twitter's too mean Facebook is all people falling for AI images Of like Jesus Hugging Nate Oates And I'm like this is not real You could do Truth Social I don't think Truth Social is right for me Probably I haven't been on it but I'm just going to guess Who's next Let's go to Bob in Jamestown Bob in Jamestown go ahead well uh jim host with the most he had some good words for mitch uh sounded good uh shame on jmf what they did to uh dave baker hopefully the new ad will go in there and find good contract lawyer and cut that jmi loose uh i'm i got my fingers crossed for the sports story of the year miami rhizocs going all the way that's your alma mater championship what do you think about Bruce Pearl Bob saying your alma mater should not be in the tournament if they lose in the conference tournament. Well, I mean, that's, that's Bruce got his opinion, but we'll see what plays out anyway. It's very magnanimous of him. Bruce has his opinion. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I appreciate the call. It'll be fascinating. You know, they won again by two points. They have won like 10 of their conference games have been two points, three points. They really do have an unbelievable ability to win these close games. I like Jimmy Dyke's line last night. He said, people keep saying they haven't beat anybody. They've beat everybody. That's a good line. I think it's a great line. They don't just beat anybody. They beat everybody. You think they play Ohio Friday night. Play Ohio Friday night. If they win, undefeated for the season, be the first time anybody's gone undefeated. So far in the last 15 years, the only two teams have gone undefeated. Gonzaga went undefeated one year, and then the 2015 Kentucky team in the regular season. Miami would be third. I expect they'll do it with Ohio Friday. They'll be a pretty big favorite. And honestly, even though they had some tight games throughout conference play, I think with the tournament right in front of them, they'll run the table in the conference tournament. But I side with Bruce. If they lose, your undefeated conversation is out of the way. So what are you showing me? We'll never, I think, really as a fan base, appreciate what that 2015 team did. They'll never be a power conference team go undefeated. And even, I mean, Gonzaga, not a power conference team. If Miami does it, not a power conference team. I mean, what's the last regular season undefeated in a power conference besides Kentucky? I guess UNLV was undefeated but also not a power conference. What conference was Wichita State in when they – Not a power conference. They were in the Missouri Valley at the time. Missouri Valley. So, I mean, is it Indiana? Is it Indiana? Yeah, it's Indiana. I mean, that deserved, like, I know we lost, but in the last 50 years, there's been one power conference team go undefeated in the regular season, and it's us. I mean, that's pretty amazing if you think about it. And just running through your conference, You know, they're not like Miami playing scrubs. The hardest team on their schedule was Kansas, and they won by 32. What, they smoked North Carolina that year? I'm sure Louisville was probably ranked when they beat them. I mean, they're non-conference. In SEC, we had like two close games. If you remember, we played Ole Miss close at home. They almost beat us. And then at LSU when Carl Towns had to hit that shot at the end to win. I think pretty much every game besides that, we had a little bit of a margin. Dominated most of that season. And it was so fun to watch. It's just a shame that title didn't end up here that year. I think A&M took them to OT, too. I think they were three. A&M. You're right. A&M did take us to OT. Who's next? Dave. Dave. Go ahead, Dave. Hey, guys. I just had a random Kentucky basketball comment. I had a question for Ryan. I've been reading this really great book called Adolph Rupp and the Rise of Kentucky Basketball. Learning a lot, especially, like, I never knew that Cliff Barker on that 1948 team was in World War II and was like a German POV, prisoner of war in like the World War II, and then come back and played for Kentucky basketball, which is fascinating. But it made me think about the show you guys did after Memorial Coliseum reopened. And Ryan had made a comment about that Adolf Rupp's office you couldn't get to or they won't let you get to or something like that. Ryan, is that the case? And I just didn't know why that was the case. Yeah, it's kind of sad, actually. It's tucked away back in a storage area. They use these offices for, like, storage. It's kind of sad when you walk back there and see where it is now, way back in the corner underneath everything. Adolph Rupp's office in Memorial? Yeah. What do you mean they won't let you? Apparently you got back there. Yeah. You have to get access to get back to a big storage area, but that's where it is to get back to it. And it's kind of sad. It's just kind of tucked away over there. Yeah. Well, that is sad. All right. So, tomorrow. So, first of all, tonight we'll be at the 13th region, get to see a little Bell County, a little Pineville. Bell County's got maybe the best freshman in the state in Braxton, Ferguson. Get us to watch him tonight. Yeah, that's a name. By the way, I think you've said this before, freshmen and sophomores. There was a sophomore they lost. Was it Mayo that went for like 45 points last night? And Josh Lindsay at St. X is a sophomore. He's a superstar. Yeah, Ballard beat Mayo in a crazy game last night in the regional. And then tomorrow we will be in Middlesboro. My mom is cooking for us for breakfast. Nice. Love Christmas breakfast. So, hey, thank you guys very much. Great to see you all today. Appreciate you coming out. Friday we are at Paul Miller. Be back here tomorrow. This has been Kentucky Sports Radio. It's the new me. And it's the old them. This Woman's History Month, the podcast, If You Knew Better with Amber Grimes, spotlights women who turn missteps into momentum and lessons into power. My, like, tunnel vision of, like, I got to achieve this was off the strengths of like, I want to make a better life for us. If You Knew Better brings real talk from women who've lived it, unpacking career pivots, relationship lessons, and the mindset shifts that changed everything. Listen to If You Knew Better with Amber Grimes on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Talking to your kids about the dangers of vaping can be hard. Getting them to listen to Hot Gossam is easy. So here's some drama you could share with your kid. Dude, did you hear about Cassie and Jake? No. Oh, but did you hear that vaping can cause irreversible lung damage and nicotine affects brain development? Nuh-uh. You don't need to gossip if you want to have an open conversation about vaping. So if you want to get tips on when and how to talk to your kids, visit talkaboutvaping.org. Brought to you by the American Lung Association and the Ad Council. Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, Here's the Thing, I talk to composer Mark Shaman. It's about the hang. It's the pleasure of hanging out with the people that you're with. You know, Rob and I was always a great hang. And journalist Chris Whipple. Every White House staffer, they work in a bubble called the West Wing. And it's exponentially more so in the Trump White House. Listen to the new season of Here's the Thing on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. The human body is a beautiful machine. And keeping it running means understanding how it actually works. Which is why this podcast will kill you is doing a multi-part series on sleep. what it's for, why our bodies don't follow neat rules, and why modern life is not helping. When you consider what we know about sleep in humans, there's one rule that comes out. We are predictably unpredictable sleepers. We'll continue exploring how the body works with a multi-part series on digestive function. So listen to our newest series, which runs January 20th through February 17th, with new episodes every Tuesday. From the Exactly Right Network, listen to This Podcast Will Kill You on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.