Calipari awaits draft fate of 'Kentucky Seven'

On Wednesday night, Canadian phenom Jamal Murray announced that he will be attending Kentucky in the fall, but before John Calipari can usher in a new recruiting class, he needs to say goodbye to some old friends on Thursday.

On Thursday night in Brooklyn’s Barclays Center, as many as seven Kentucky Wildcats could hear their names called by Adam Silver in the 2015 NBA Draft. Karl-Anthony Towns, Devin Booker, Willie Cauley-Stein, Dakari Johnson, the Harrison twins, Andrew and Aaron, and Saskatoon's Trey Lyles are all eligible and stand a strong chance of entering this season’s draft class. If that were to happen, Calipari’s Wildcats will set the record for most selections from a single school in one year.

As impressive as this testament to the quality of the Kentucky program might be, it doesn’t come as a surprise to Calipari in the slightest. The 2015 inductee to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame credits the success of his charges to the philosophy he and his staff preach at Lexington.

“We’re basically playing position-less basketball and have for some time,” Calipari said in a conference call last week. “It’s not trying to pigeonhole any player at one point. I want them all to be multi-position players.”

Calipari, whose team went undefeated last season until a 71-64 loss to Wisconsin in the Final Four, believes that every one of his exiting players benefited from this line of thinking.

”When you look at Willie, Karl – if he had his druthers would’ve been a two-guard and now you’re talking about a post player who can step out on the court,” Calipari explained. “Trey, we put at a three position to make him more versatile. Now, you’re talking our guards who are big – because of Tyler Ulis, Andrew can play with another point guard. Aaron can play the three if he has to because of his size. You’re looking at Devin Booker and you’re saying, ‘Wait a minute.’ That kind of shooting and that kind of size and all of a sudden, you get what we were trying to do. Our goal is not just to help guys get into the league. We want guys to become All-Stars.”

Towns very well might be the first of this group to become an All-Star. Widely tipped to go first overall to the Minnesota Timberwolves, the 19-year-old centre could follow in the footsteps of John Wall (2010) and Anthony Davis (2012) as players coached by Calipari at Kentucky taken with the top selection. Calipari is impressed with how far he’s come and even believes that he reined in some of the New Jersey native’s talent.

“He’s developed into a player,” Calipari said of Towns. “He had no real post game. Like I told him, ‘You’re going to be a post player who can play out on the floor. You’re going to learn how to play pick-and-roll defence. You’re going to have an idea how to keep a quicker guard in front of you and block shots and still play that way. You will fly up and down this court. You have the chance to be the number-one pick.’

"At this point, he’s going to have the opportunity it appears. But [he’s] one of the nicest people you’re ever going to meet. He can shoot threes. That’s not going to be who he is, but you’re going to have to guard him in pick-and-pops or if he’s trailing in the break. He has more ball skills than I’ve let him show. I forced him – he had no choice – you’re catching that ball four feet and scoring or you won’t be in the game. All of a sudden, he became unstoppable late in the year… and I’ve had good ones, but he’s right there with those guys that when you look back and say whoever picks them, they’ll never get traded. There’s only a few of those in the league.”

While Towns’s growth is notable, Cauley-Stein’s is almost improbable. With Calipari famously never having seen Cauley-Stein play high school ball, the Kansas-born junior was a late bloomer, transitioning from tennis to basketball.

“A lot of these kids have been groomed since they were six-years-old,” Calipari said. “Well, Willie really started playing when he came with us. When I saw him in high school at an AAU event, he had two points and like two rebounds in a game. He’s from the state of Kansas and Kansas did not recruit him. So what I say to you is, offensively, he’s better than you think and mold him to be what you want him to be. When you have those kind of feet and hands…people say, ‘Well, he’s only coming into his own now. Why?’ Because he just started playing. I’m looking at him and saying that he’s one of those guys who’ll do those things that get a team over the hump. He’s one of those guys who’s going to do it.”

Again, Calipari points to Cauley-Stein’s versatility as to why the lottery pick talk is warranted.

“You get a guy who’s seven-foot – and he might be bigger – whose feet and hands are that of a 6’3", super-athletic guard, which means he can guard five positions,” Calipari said of Cauley-Stein. “He can guard a point guard, he can guard a big guy. He adds shot-blocking. In the schemes of what I’m seeing in the NBA, which are pick-and-run to the rim and make him play that guy, putting guys in the dribble-drive motion, which you saw with Golden State when guys are behind the backboard – Utah used to do it – he can do all that.”

Though, Cauley-Stein isn’t a lock for the lottery, Booker most likely is. Calipari thinks the sweet-shooting two guard from Grand Rapids, Michigan is not yet the finished article, but liked the improvement he showed over his year at Lexington.

“My concern for him was defensive - I knew he could shoot,” Calipari said of the 18-year-old. “When we got him, my whole thing was you’re not going to be a standstill shooter. You’re going to create going to the basket and you’re going to defend or you won’t play. He ends up being a better defensive player - a much better defensive player than I ever imagined.”

If he continues along the trajectory he’s on right now, Calipari feels that Booker is capable of emulating a particular All-Star guard.

“We all grew up shooting set shots…you’d tiptoe-shoot and jump three inches off the ground and that’s when you’d really jump,” Calipari explained. “This kid jumps when he shoots around the elbow. He’ll jump 18 inches and let it go. We had to get him to get it off quicker. In high school, you jump over them and there’s no one there. Well, in college, if you jump, they’re jumping and you’ve gotta jump and get it off quicker because they can’t get as high, moving, as you can with that ball. The second thing was, you don’t want to be a guy in that league that’s just a catch-and-shoot guy because they’ll take that away. In a rotation, defensively, you have to be able to get it to the rim. You have to be able to finish where there’s contact. You create the contact and finish. We worked on all that with him and he came so far, but has a ways to go with that. But that’s all stuff the NBA will clean up. You’re talking about a big guard who can shoot - Klay Thompson-ish, that’s what he looks like.”

Canadian eyes will be focused on Trey Lyles come Thursday. After two straight seasons of a Canadian going first overall (Anthony Bennett and Andrew Wiggins) and three Canadians taken in the first round last year (Wiggins, Nik Stauskas and Tyler Ennis), Lyles will be the only player from north of the 49^th taken in the first round (Boston College point guard Olivier Hanlan of Aylmer, Quebec is expected to be taken in the second). Even this late in the game, there is still little consensus as to where Lyles will end up being selected. Calipari remembers the New York Knicks being particularly enamoured with the 6’10" stretch four after a visit in the spring.

“Phil [Jackson] watched practice, watched shootaround and watched the game,” Calipari recalled. “What I’m hearing is he walked away saying that this is the kind of player [you want] in the triangle. He’s 6’10". We played him at the three. I could have had him closer to the elbows and baskets and he could have scored more and done more, but people who really know the game walked away saying, ‘Wait a minute.’ The kid can shoot, he can pass. He’s really skilled. He’s got size. He’s physical enough to be able to come in and guard his position right now. I think they really liked him.”

Calipari, who also spent time with UMass and Memphis, as well as an NBA stint with the New Jersey Nets, was quick to dispel any criticism of Lyles’s toughness.

“The one thing I think people don’t realize about Trey - because he is soft-spoken – they think he’s not assertive,” Calipari said. “Let me just say that if a fight breaks out, he’s not moving. He will not move. That stuff is in him…he gets in a competitive environment and it just comes out. Again, I think he’s a guy who, whoever takes him, they’re going to say we didn’t realize [his toughness]…I’m not worried about Trey and I’m also not worried about when he gets in there and how he’s going to perform because he’s got a fight in him now.”

The 56-year-old native of Moon Township, Pennsylvania isn’t even worried about Aaron Harrison, the only member of the Kentucky Seven who is by no means a surefire pick on Thursday night. A sophomore from San Antonio, Harrison faces the very real prospect of watching the rest of his teammates, including his twin, get drafted while he looks to the Summer League as a means to a training camp invite. Calipari doesn’t think he should lose any sleep over that scenario.

“I think he’ll be drafted,” Calipari said of Aaron Harrison. “Let me say this – I’ll even go further – I think he’ll be in the league for a while. I believe that because [his] being able to play multiple positions – he’s not locked in to any position – [being] 6’6" and his size. Everyone knows he makes game-winning shots. There’s not a whole lot in the league like that, let alone guys in the draft. I think he’s going to be fine.”

The current record for most selections from one school in a draft is six. It’s held jointly by the 1977 UNLV Runnin’ Rebels and Calipari’s own 2012 Wildcats. Three years ago, Davis (No. 1, New Orleans), Michael Kidd-Gilchrist (2, Charlotte), Terrence Jones (18, Houston), Marquis Teague (29, Chicago), Doron Lamb (42, Philadelphia) and Darius Miller (46, New Orleans) were called up to the podium by David Stern.

Calipari isn’t really interested in comparing the 2012 and 2015 classes. He just wants all of his former players to succeed at the pro level.

“I come back to position-less basketball,” Calipari said. “We’re teaching that it’s not one way of playing, it’s a lot of ways of playing. We want all of these kids – look, it’s not just make the league. I want them to be All-Stars. We’re waiting on (former Wildcat) Julius (Randle). What’s he going to be? He was injured. What about Nerlens Noel? I mean, how he played at the end of the season after his injuries, where would he be? What about Brandon Knight? Everybody’s forgotten about him because he got hurt late. Eric Bledsoe’s on the edge of being an All-Star. I’m proud of all these guys. And these guys have a lot to live up to playing here, being from Kentucky and being in the league. It’d be a heck of a thing, like I said, if, at the end of the day, we’re looking at this and let’s get half the All-Star Game [to come] through here. That would be a fun thing to see.”

A big night on Thursday for the Kentucky Wildcats would go a long way in making that a reality for John Calipari.