Watch: Calipari defends Fox, coaching profession in postgame rant
Kentucky pulled out an 82-77 victory over Georgia on Saturday night despite the fact the Wildcats trailed by two with 45 seconds remaining. After the game, head coach John Calipari was fired up, but not so much because of the win.
Calipari pre-emptively came to the defense of his counterpart, Bulldogs head coach Mark Fox, whose team looks to be in danger of potentially missing the NCAA tournament for the fifth time in six years after Georgia failed to earn a signature win.
"He keeps his team together," Calipari said. "That's coaching. Not when things are going good. It's when things go south and you lose a bunch in a row, how do you get them and go."
The Bulldogs lost star forward Yante Maten to a knee injury just 95 seconds into the game, and Calipari pointed to the fact the team stayed competitive throughout as a testament to Fox's coaching abilities.
"They do this to us without Maten," Calipari added. "That's what kind of coach Mark Fox is. So again, 'Well, we want to win more.' No kidding. We all want to. Live with my shoes. You want to win more? We gotta win by 25 or we got problems. We win by two or in overtime, people are jumping off bridges. So we all want to win, but it's about what kind of coach he is, what kind of man he is."
Kentucky's bench boss also weighed in on NC State's recent in-season firing of Mark Gottfried and had an interesting suggestion for other coaches trying to avoid a similar fate.
"We're firing coaches in midseason. Are you shitting me? We're firing coaches in midseason," Calipari said. "You know what I'm putting in my contract? You can fire me at midseason, but you're going to have to pay me $3 million. Oh, you'll let me stay now, won't you. ... Every coach in the country, put it in your contract.
"Every coach in the country, put it in your contract. What if Mark Gottfried goes on a run at the end and gets to the NCAA tournament, which he was in four out of five years? Two Sweet 16s, which is not done at NC State. What happens if he now - if he goes and wins and gets another team (in)? He had good players but they're young, they're like my team. It's hard to do this with young guys."