Quotes from John Calipari

I think part of the reason some coaches don't want to be involved with social media is that they expect to be able to do it at a certain level. A lot of them are like, 'I'm not going to do it if we can't hit 100,000 or 200,000 followers.' Well, you're not going to right away.

I'm going to continue to see my friends who coach in the NBA and see my former players who play in the NBA. I'm going to continue to go to games.

The problem with the NCAA - it's slow-moving.

The problem with my guys, all my guys, they come in and improve themselves so fast in college: they go from 'He's this and this' to 'That kid is the first pick or second pick. Four. Five. Seven.' Tell me about those teams: not great. So my guys are walking into bad situations.

I'm a teacher, a motivator. That's what I do. And I'm a protector on top of that.

I don't read the papers; I don't listen to radio.

My wife runs the house. She raised our kids with me only partly there. It's just what coaching is. A lot of times, you're raising other people's children, sometimes at the expense of your own. I hope that wasn't the case with my children, but at times, it probably was.

All my best players have been really good guys, which means I can coach them.

They want it all - all As, all wins by 20, and want the highest GPA. Don't coach at Kentucky if you can't accept that.

The thing I can tell you about coaching is that we make decision and career moves when your nerves and emotions are still raw, right after the season. It's the worst profession for that.

I'm not the grand poobah. I'm not the emperor. That's not what I want to be.

Some of the best kids I coach were raised by a grandmother who was so firm that they understood.

John Wooden's books are great.

If you recruit a kid, and you're promising him the world, how in the world are you going to coach him in that short a period of time to do that?

I'm not embarrassed about how we recruit, how we treat kids, and how we coach them.

Can I say this in a humble way - I don't need the money. If I stop coaching today at Kentucky, my toes are up, and I'm eating Cheetos, and I'm fine.

You've gotta learn to love the grind. Because life IS the grind.

If the NBA is worried about the NBA, if the NCAA is worried about the NCAA, if each individual institution is just worried about themselves, and the last thing we think about is these kids, then we're going to make wrong decisions. There are a lot of players of different levels, of different abilities. Let's be fair with them.

When we're worried about a bureaucracy and keeping the bureaucracy going, you're always going to make mistakes.

People, on their bucket lists, are saying, 'I want to see a game at Rupp Arena.' Magic Johnson will call and say, 'I want to come to the game tonight. I want to see John Wall or Anthony Davis or Michael Kidd-Gilchrist.' It's become fashionable to be seen here, because people want to be seen and associated with success.

When you're trying to make somebody the best version of themselves, you have to keep defining that over a period of time because sometimes it changes.

It's not just about working hard, it's about working together. You have to care more about the team than you do about yourself

The guy who started on third base and gets home and acts like he hit a homer - that guy doesn't impress me.

I've always taken the approach that it's about the seed in the NCAA tournament.