Kentucky has arrived to Music City to take on the first SEC Tournament under Mark Pope’s coaching helm, looking to find the program’s first win in the event since March 11, 2022, 1,098 days ago (on the day of their first game). A win in Bridgestone Arena will also be the program’s first win in the building for a SEC Tournament game since March 15, 2019, 2,190 days ago (on the day of their first game). So, it’s been a while, and this fanbase is desperate for some success.

Kentucky will look to play the winner of 11-seed Georgia and 14-seed Oklahoma, on Thursday night around 9:30 PM ET. This afternoon, just roughly 32 hours out from tipoff, Mark Pope sat with reporters on site to preview Kentucky’s slate. I’ve wrote about his most important comments.

After Kentucky having quite the drought with SEC tournament wins, Pope was asked about the importance of this event and the game as they ramp up closer and closer to action.

“There is nothing in the world that my guys would like more than to gift BBN an incredible week here. That means a lot to us. We’re really devoted to doing everything we can humanly possible to make that happen.”

On this tournament creating a neutral environment for the matchups but Kentucky usually having the dominant volume of fans in attendance every year, Mark Pope was not surprised and expects to see it again this year.

“It’s Kentucky, right? There’s no fanbase like this in the world. It means so much, and that’s part of the reason why it means so much to us.”

I arrived here myself for game one of the Wednesday session, and I can say there is already a force of UK blue in attendance, ready to root on their team tomorrow night. At the moment there is currently every fanbase here, but no one to match the Big Blue Nation through my eyes.

Kentucky’s coming off of a big-time road win at #15 Missouri just last weekend, improving their SEC record to 10-8 heading into the conference tournament. They were selected as a 6-seed for the event, receiving the single bye and not having to play on Wednesday. If they were to win their Thursday game, they’d advance to take on 3-seed Alabama on Friday night for the last game of the day.

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