[laughs]

I was there.

And Louisville's been on him for a long time.

LSU, um, Wichita State's another school that's been in there.

But, um, this is an interesting class with the guards, where I think that a lot of schools are just evaluating their options with these high school point guards.

And then when it gets down to it, they'll see how high they're willing to go NIL-wise.

Um, we all know what LSU's capable of, Will Wade NI- NIL-wise.

Uh, it looks like they're, like, almost planning on Malachi leaving after this year.

Be positive

...

so yeah, I mean, you saw what you have in Keon Holes, and that was huge.

Um, and you didn't even have a very good game from Isaac Brown.

So if you ma- if you get one, 2% better than you were in that last game, I think they could beat really anyone on their schedule this year.

You can't expel everybody

... you can't expel everybody, and you need to put together rules that are gonna be upheld by the courts so that you can actually enforce them.

'Cause LSU is basically just exploiting almost a loophole where the NCAA is not allowing something that the courts are allowing.

I mean, at minimum, this has to be a two seed.

I kind of feel like Kelsey is in the same exact boat that Pope was in last year.

Was in last year, 100%.

Where you got one of the most expensive rosters in college basketball, if not the most expensive.

Kelsey has a little – I give him a little bit more leeway because he was taking over a much worse position than Pope was.

So that's why his year three is Pope's – or his – Yeah, his year three is Pope's year two.

And so if this year goes poorly, then next year feels like a do-or-die year.

Jacob, do you want to give us a little tease so we don't have to maybe go read about it on our free VIP today?

I think both fan bases should be like,

They should both be eligible.

They're rooting for both guys because they're such similar situations that if one guy's ineligible, there's a good chance the other guy's ineligible, and if one guy's eligible, there's a good chance the other guy is eligible.

So if you're a Louisville fan, I wouldn't be rooting against Mark Mitchell getting eligibility, and if you're a Kentucky fan, I wouldn't be rooting against Trimble getting eligibility.

If both guys are eligible, it fits both teams well.

In your opinion, as somebody who covers the rival, what looks like a win for Will Stein? Is it just get a win? What looks

successful? Week one.

Youngstown State.

I

think Trimble was an easy one because he entered the portal in the spring.

So there was no concerns.

The only thing is, is the Colorado injunction going to go through? If that goes through, he's cleared, he's good to go.

If that doesn't, then they can file a state lawsuit and try and get him eligible through that.

And having him committed allows Louisville to do that on his behalf, I believe.

Don't quote me on that.

I think Louisville needs to keep the expectations, what they should always have been, not adjust them because Kenny Payne was so bad.

Oh, I can tell you that.

On the sideline, in the end zone, on a throw that I think Steven Johnson was getting hit as he threw and just let it go down the sideline.

And there's Dorian Baker on like a third and whatever.

They probably would have had to have punted or maybe they would have kicked a field goal.

I think they were close enough to do that.

Then you have the interceptions, the fumbles.

even to get into field goal range, there was the, the opening play with the, the, I love this blank.

Yeah, that was so neat.

Yeah.

So...

I mean, I don't have the highest hopes for this team.

I think that a problem with Kentucky, and it's a problem with Louisville as well, is they're going to have a tough time climbing into that upper echelon of teams because just by how last season went, they had to rebuild and they didn't bring back a lot of continuity.

And I think both teams are going to run into that issue where...

The best teams in college basketball reloaded with some guys they already had and added pieces onto that.

Like Florida.

yeah I do worry about that position though is that fair is it I mean it's Reese Potter might have to play some minutes this year I mean I

Although I will say, I think this team's built to do a couple different things than last year's team, Jacob.

Yeah, and I saw last year Kentucky and Louisville having pretty similar years of second-year head coach coming off a first year that inspired the fan bases, bringing in a very talented – future pro in Mikel Brown and Jaden Quaintance, neither of them doing quite what fans expected.

I think Mikel had a little bit, obviously had a better year than JQ who only played a few games, but, and now both, both schools are kind of going into year three with, This is the most important year of their tenure so far, and Louisville obviously was among the biggest spenders this offseason, if not the biggest spender.

I'm probably higher on the team than a lot of people, but I do think that I think that they're outside that top five and borderline top ten, but I don't know what they could have done this offseason to get into there because I think that these top five teams, the teams at the upper echelon of college basketball, are that way because they have a lot of retention.

Sorry, Jacob.

Yeah, I agree.

I think Woolley is due for, I don't want to say a huge jump, but due for an improvement.

And then you have Montgomery.

And what he did at Peach Jam really just was kind of the cherry on top of what has been one of the most special summers of basketball that I've seen in my 15 or so years of doing this.

Yeah, I'll piggyback off that.

I saw I saw Caden play in Memphis at the first live session.

And at that point, I mean, he wasn't an unknown.

He was a borderline five star, four star kid.

And he just took it to Jet Academy with Chase Lumpkin, a guy that's got a Kentucky offer and a Louisville offer.

Um, and so I knew he was a player, but then with this USA run with Vegas and then peach jam, like that's when you realize, okay, he's in the upper echelon of this class.

If I could hand-select somebody to be a Kentucky Wildcat right now, it would be Darius Wobbington, who plays for Compton Magic on the Adidas circuit.

Is this like a type of situation where Wolves just kind of takes the first player that wants to join and celebrates?

Yeah, I mean, if either of those guys say, hey, I want to commit, I can't imagine Louisville's turning them down.

But I think that Louisville has a choice to make on how hard they pursue one guy or the other.

It's worth noting, like, I still have my doubts about Reese Alston reclassifying, but it's something that his people are bringing up.

His dad brought it up.

So it's something that they're potentially looking at.

And LSU would make some sense there if he were to move into the 26 class.

like,

I mean, if Kentucky fans – I'm not going to read any of my Twitter replies,

but if they want to say something to me, they want to be really mean to me and say something that I'm going to listen to – You should probably subscribe to Cardinal Authority.

I'm checking all my DMs on the message board there.

Always be selling.

Always.

Yeah, I mean, it's funny because I was at KSR and for a lot of the Kentucky fan base, a lot of them did accept me, but a lot of them didn't really accept me.

And they were like, you're a Kansas fan.

But man, if you were at Louisville just a few, if you were at Louisville a decade ago, you really missed out on some major stuff.

talents someplace else.

Mitch Barnhart and I are a package deal.

Oh, okay.

We decided.

I actually, yeah, I was really trying to do retirement with a million dollar paycheck.

Did you get the gold parachute? No, but nobody was willing to negotiate that one with me.

Well, you got to go to Europe.

What I've

would never I if somebody said hey, what's up? And I didn't recognize the number you best believe I'm not responding.

Hey, what's up? Oh, I don't recognize this number.

Let me tell them everything about my recruitment.

Here's my social security number.

I didn't like that at all.

I didn't like it.

Oh, hey, what's up? Oh, I'm coming to Kentucky.

thanks for taking away the goofiness.

That's exactly what I'm doing, Jonathan.

It's not like the NBA where you have a salary cap and all that.

We don't know what these teams are working with as far as money.

So say like throwing out the money conversation, last year was different where it was such a public number.

Um, it, it came out there that there was that Lexington Herald report.

Um, but the thing with this year's roster, I don't see, at least on June 9th, I'm sure there will be question marks that pop up.

But last year there was a clear question mark with Jaiden Quaintance.

Yeah, I was gonna ask that.

That had to have played a part in some of his behavior changes.

Yeah, and I mean, I'm not going to be here and say I'm making some sort of flip on how I feel about Mark Pope.

I think that in the past, especially the Tyron Stokes recruitment, I think that was handled very poorly.

I think that their reads were not right, and I think that that was a recruitment that they failed at.

But I think it's equally as important to say, look, they learned from that recruitment.

They made the changes necessary, and it's paying dividends.

It's paying dividends in the Milan recruitment.

By the way, Lew Alcindor is the greatest of all time.

All

right.

Kentucky's...

And...

So this 2027 recruiting class is not considered very good, but I think there are some really good players in this class, and Kentucky's at a point where last year or this past offseason, they went after the top guy in the class, and they put all their chips in on Tyron Stokes and really didn't leave themselves much of an out because he dragged it out until the very end.

I think that with this class, yes, you have C.J. Rosser, who's the number one player in the class.

But there's a lot more balance.

Don't you think?

All

right.

Kentucky's...

And...

So this 2027 recruiting class is not considered very good, but I think there are some really good players in this class, and Kentucky's at a point where last year or this past offseason, they went after the top guy in the class, and they put all their chips in on Tyron Stokes and really didn't leave themselves much of an out because he dragged it out until the very end.

I think that with this class, yes, you have C.J. Rosser, who's the number one player in the class.

But there's a lot more balance.

Don't you think?