Kentucky Basketball: 2022-23 season preview and outlook for Wildcats

There’s no real reason to be concerned about Kentucky Basketball or John Calipari, but you have to at least stop and think for a minute. Calipari took this program to a national title in 2012, part of a run of four Final Four’s in five seasons near the beginning of his tenure. While the Wildcats have not returned to the Final Four since 2015, their near-perfect campaign, the program has still churned out winning teams.

But let’s take a minute to consider that reason for concern because Kentucky hasn’t exactly been up to its usual standards lately. In fact, the Wildcats haven’t won an NCAA Tournament game in three years, which seems like a bizarre and impossible streak. The pandemic cancelled the Tournament in 2020 and they were abysmal, finishing just 9-16 the following season. Last year saw Kentucky become the first victim to Saint Peter’s, who told an unbelievable Cinderella story in the Big Dance.

These recent seasons have only increased both the pressure and the drive for this year’s Kentucky squad. While last year’s team failed to make any headway in the NCAA Tournament, there will be a significant amount of returning talent this season. We’ll dive into all the important names on this roster ahead, but anytime the national player of the year is on your roster, you can expect great things from a team.

The college basketball landscape is changing, and the growth of the transfer portal and the addition of NIL deals went a long way towards the construction of this roster. We’ll talk a bit about Oscar Tshiebwe, and you likely know a lot about him already, but he’s back this year because of those NIL inclusions. We also know that Calipari is a fantastic recruiter, bringing freshman talent to Lexington on a regular basis, but he also hit a home run in the transfer portal this offseason.

We’ll be taking a close look at this Kentucky team, with particular focus on the roster, the schedule, and what exactly we can expect from these Wildcats. As has been the case many times in the last decade, Kentucky has high expectations for this upcoming season, with a talented and somewhat experienced roster coming together under Calipari. Can this program break out of its recent slump, perhaps getting back to the Final Four for the first time in nearly a decade?