Memphis cancels John Calipari celebration
The school has called off its “homecoming” after backlash from scorned alums—proving again how the coach is maligned outside of Rupp Arena.
While Kentucky fans are holding parades and parties for John Calipari’s induction into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame, there’s a university down the road that is anything but happy for its former coach.
Like a scorned ex, the University of Memphis not only doesn’t want Cal to flourish, they definitely don’t want to hear about it when he does. Memphis president M. David Rudd announced via Twitter Wednesday the University planned on honoring Calipari Dec. 28 and 29 with the commentary “Will be a great homecoming.” The Tiger faithful didn’t quite agree.
The University offices were flooded with phone calls and emails, and Rudd’s tweet received hundreds of responses, almost exclusively against the idea of honoring the coach who burned them.
Just as a refresher, Calipari was hired at Memphis in 2000 and ushered in an extremely successful era of Memphis basketball. Under Calipari, Memphis won the 2002 NIT Title, and reached the NCAA Tournament six times, including a trip to the National Championship game in 2008. The following seaosn, Calipari resigned from Memphis to coach the University of Kentucky Wildcats, and took his recruits with him. Those recruits included Darnell Dodson and DeMarcus Cousins.
Shortly after Cal’s departure, the NCAA formally charged Memphis with infractions surrounding Derrick Rose’s eligibility, including allegations of a false SAT score, and money given to his brother. Memphis had all 38 wins in the 2008 season vacated, and spent the next three years on probation.
This was not Cal’s first run in with NCAA infractions, in his time at UMass, the Minutemen’s 1996 tournament run was vacated due to allegations surrounding Marcus Camby receiving up to $40,000 during his time in the program.
While Memphis was on trial in the courts of the NCAA, Cal was taking off at his new home in Lexington. Big Blue Nation welcomed the coach with open arms. After a decade of Tubby Smith basketball and two rocky years under Billy Gillespie, the Wildcats were ready to be back on top of college basketball, and Cal was their ticket.
In his first year with UK, Calipari signed what is widely considered one of the greatest recruiting classes ever. That class included John Wall, Eric Bledsoe, and former Memphis recruit DeMarcus Cousins. That team went to the NCAA Elite Eight, and the next year to the Final Four. By 2012 Kentucky had a National Championship. Meanwhile, the Tigers had just gotten off of NCAA probation.
Jump back to present day, John Calipari is everywhere. He is a best-selling author, has becoming college basketball royalty once again, and signs 5-star recruit after 5-star recruit. And now he’s a part of the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame. The eternal second-chance giver that is the American public seems to have forgotten Coach Cal’s numerous run-in’s with the NCAA, but the folks in Memphis sure haven’t.
That was never more evident than in the responses to Rudd’s announcement. In the hours that followed, Tiger faithful tweeted him with comments like “I think you got hacked,” “#Nowins,” “#Vacated” and numerous inquiries as to if it was a joke. The torrent of responses prompted Rudd to issue a series of follow up tweets in the following 24 hours.
The progression of tweets escalated from “Looks like my tweet has generated a few responses. Some pretty funny all very passionate. I read them all, appreciate the passion.” at 6:39 p.m. on Wednesday, to “Please know that I have read all of your notes and listened to all of our calls. I will provide a statement tomorrow, hopefully before noon.” at 4:55 the next day.
That statement was released 6:41 on Sept 10, exactly one day after the announcement. In the statement, Rudd took complete responsibility for the plan to honor Calipari, apologized for all of the bad emotions it brought about and stated that Memphis would not be honoring Calipari.
“I apologize for the unnecessary upset, embarrassment and genuine distress generated by the issue of honoring Coach John Calipari on the occasion of his installation in to the College Basketball Hall of Fame,” Rudd said.
“Although I was surprised by the depth and intensity of conviction,passion and distress, it was my responsibility to understand and weigh this in advance.”
Rudd went on to talk about living a life driven by values and leading an institution that has those same values, “the very values so many of you have expressed.” Rudd noted that the cancellation of Calipari’s homecoming would not end the debate, but would hopefully bring the chapter to close for the fans.
To many outside of Memphis, it may seem like sour grapes, canceling the ceremony after a bunch of disgruntled fans tweet the president. But the truth of the matter is, not everyone looks at Calipari as the architect of a great college basketball career. Every college basketball fan doesn’t think he’s the best recruiter in the history of the game. The reality that Memphis showed us is, when some people look at John Calipari, all they see is a cheater.
