ESPN is doing a series on school’s that were prominent with certain coaches and they explain how they are chasing their ghosts after they have moved on.
UMass was a top program with John Calipari but after he left they haven’t been relevant in the big picture of college basketball.
One question they asked was if we were in an alternate universe and Cal stayed at UMass like Mark Few has at Gonzaga, what kind of program would it be right now?
Let’s consider an alternate universe in which John Calipari aspires to be Mark Few and stays at UMass in 1996 instead of looking for new challenges elsewhere. What are we saying about UMass’ place in college basketball today?
Borzello: Well, we would have to consider an alternate universe in which he never leaves. And if that’s the case, UMass is probably the East Coast Gonzaga, the Gonzaga of the Atlantic 10, consistently winning the league and staying near the top of the rankings. That said, Calipari and Mark Few have very different personalities, and it’s unlikely that alternate universe could ever have been remotely possible. But if it happened, I think the Minutemen are still a major factor on the national scene and competing for high-level recruits. Calipari has been successful at each of his college stops, and he’s followed a similar formula in terms of recruiting — it makes sense that he would have kept it rolling at UMass.Gasaway: This should be the part where I say the only Gonzaga is Gonzaga, and that you can’t expect every program to chart the sport’s most spectacular and unexpected ascendance in the last 25 years. But here’s the thing about Calipari. He took UMass to the Final Four. He took Memphis to the Final Four, and by the time he left that job, he was landing talent like Derrick Rose, Tyreke Evans and, let’s not forget, DeMarcus Cousins (who was set to be a Tiger until Calipari left for Kentucky). The best information we have for Calipari when he was outside the major conferences is that, given sufficient time, he was capable of achieving Gonzaga-type results wherever he went.
Medcalf: With that beautiful campus? UMass would be — and I’m not sure anyone else has mentioned this yet — kind of like Gonzaga. I was really impressed when I visited the UMass campus for the first time during the Derek Kellogg years. Then, an assistant coach told me, “All we have to do is get them on campus, and then we have them.” That wasn’t completely true, but I do believe Calipari would have sold his vision, the program and that school to the same five-star prospects he’s attracted throughout his run in college basketball.
You can read “Chasing Ghosts: John Calipari left, and UMass basketball died” by clicking here.
