The Kentucky Wildcats (19-0) have every first place vote in America except for one…long time UK detractor John Feinstein.
The Wildcats received 64 of 65 first place votes in the new AP Top 25 today with Feinstein continuing to vote for Virginia.
The Cavaliers are also 19-0 but barely escaped a mediocre Virginia Tech team on Sunday. The Wildcats impressively dismantled South Carolina on the road.
Feinstein has a long history of jabbing at Kentucky. BigBlueHistory.net has an excellent run down of Feinstein’s career of UK hate. Here is an excerpt:
Tony Kornheiser: And now being coached by a guy who can get great recruits, even if they’re there only one year, can get them year after year after year. Right ?
John Feinstein: I made a comment to somebody, maybe even Andy and Steve because they were asking me about why Duke has been, you know, good but not great the last five years and hasn’t been to a Final Four since 2004. And I said, you know, in most programs, you cannot just have four-year players, because you need a couple of those superstar types who are only going to stay a year or two. And you cannot just have one-and-dones, unless you’re John Calipari. John Calipari can win with one-and-dones. He did it at Memphis and he’s doing it again this year at Kentucky.
Tony Kornheiser: It’s pretty amazing isn’t it ?
John Feinstein: Well, you know, a coach who I will not name, said to me not that long ago that he thinks John Calipari is, this are his words, ‘Is the most dangerous coach in college basketball.’
And I said ‘why’.
And he said ‘Because he’s a hell of a coach, he’s a nice guy, everybody likes him and he cheats his butt off.’
Tony Kornheiser: Well he’s certainly been involved in scandals.
John Feinstein: He’s had two. Yeah, you know, if you want to go and lawyer up the whole thing, he was never technically implicated either at UMASS or Memphis. That said, both of those final Fours were vacated.
My theory has always been, the head coach gets the credit and he gets the big bucks when things go well, he needs to take the blame when they don’t.
And I like John too, I’ve known John since he was working for Larry Brown for Kansas in the 80’s and I first met him actually at Five Star, and I like him, and I do think he’s a hell of a coach.
But I think Wilbon had a pretty good description, years ago, (obviously he and John were never close, otherwise he’d be writing that John should be in the Hall of Fame) when he said: “We all know John tends to color outside the lines.” And I think that’s probably a pretty fair assessment.
