On Monday evening, Kentucky men’s basketball coach John Calipari announced on his official website that he is considering an opportunity to coach the national team of the Dominican Republic. Calipari said that he was approached about the position during this past season but waited until after the conclusion of his team’s run to the 2011 Final Four to seriously weigh the possibility.”During the season, I was approached by the Dominican Basketball Federation to become involved in helping grow basketball in their country,” Calipari said on CoachCal.com. “Now that our season is over, I can now give proper attention to other things, such as this.”Calipari’s experience with Chinese basketball is what made him attractive to the Dominican national team.”My question to the Dominican Basketball Federation was, why are you calling me?” Calipari said. “Their response was, they liked what we are doing in China, including coaching their coaches and being involved in promoting grassroots basketball.”Not only would I help train coaches in the Dominican Republic and here in Lexington like we have with the Chinese coaches, but I would also coach their national team.”If Calipari does choose to accept the position, his responsibilities would begin this summer and training with the team would take place in Lexington.”The commitment would mainly be from the start of August through mid-September,” Calipari said. “The Dominican Republic national team would train in our state-of-the-art facilities at the Joe Craft Center in Lexington prior to the start of the Tournament of the Americas, which would begin towards the end of August.”Calipari’s duties would not interfere with those of his job with Kentucky and he hopes that Kentucky fans will “adopt” the Dominican Republic team.”I wanted the Big Blue Nation to be aware of what’s going on in your program,” Calipari said. “If I move forward on this, I’ll be asking you to adopt the Dominican Republic national team as your third team behind your Kentucky Wildcats and Team USA. I also want to let all our friends in China know that we will continue our relationship with the CBA and their coaches.”