Monday kicked off the first of this year’s Southeastern Conference men’s basketball teleconference with the league’s coaches. Cat Scratches will have the full transcript of head coach John Calipari each week, as well as Kentucky’s upcoming SEC opponent head coach.Kentucky opens SEC play Saturday against Georgia. Here is what Georgia head coach Mark Fox and Calipari had to say:

Full audio from each head coachMark FoxQuestion: Can you give us some brief comments on your team entering SEC play?Fox: I think we’re off to a good start. We have beaten the teams we’re supposed to beat, but I think we’re improved as a team. I think we’re a little better basketball team than we were last year. I think we have a more complete team this year. We have found some ways to win. That doesn’t mean we’ve played great every night. We enter league play knowing that we have to play a lot better to win games because we are going to play some terrific teams. We open with a great one who is also playing very, very well.Question: Can you talk about what ways you feel like you are a more complete team and the things you’ve seen from Kentucky that have impressed you?Fox: I think that we can score the ball from more places this year. We feel like we’re a deeper team. We certainly feel like we’re a more experienced team. We have a deeper, more experienced roster. We have some guys who are in their second year of our system, so they’re more comfortable doing what we’re trying to do. Kentucky, they’re just terrific. They’re shooting the 3 at a very high clip. I think they’re scoring from lots of different places. I think they’re playing together. They’re a terrific defensive team, probably underappreciated in how good their defense is. This is a very good basketball team we’re getting ready to play and a team we have a lot of respect for. We’ll have to get geared up.Question: Coach, can you talk about how Gerald Robinson has played this season?Fox: Gerald Robinson is off to a good start. He’s averaging double figures for us and is leading us in assists as well. He would probably be the first one to tell you he could play better, but I think he’s off to a good start because he was able to sit out last year. He really used his redshirt year as a way to get better. He added almost 20 pounds to his frame. He’s really made an impact on our team and he’s a guy who I think will continue to get better throughout the year. He had a little bit of a rough start, but he’s hungry to get all the rust knocked off.Question: Can you talk about how Trey Thompkins has played so far this year and do you remember anything about Josh Harrellson from last year?Fox: Thompkins, the injury that he had really came at a terrible time for our team. He missed basically the entire month of November in practice. We played him down in Orlando after basically completing one practice prior to the tournament, the day before the game, a walk-through practice before a three-game tournament. He’s really kind of been thrown back into the fire without much practice time. We’ve tried to get him back in a rhythm, back in shape and get the ankle back in shape, and that’s really taken some time. Taking that into consideration, I think Trey has had a pretty good start. It’s hard for a guy to be as productive as he’s been if you don’t practice, but he was still able to be very productive for us. I think he’s finally starting to feel like his old self. I think he’s feeling healthy, and that’s good for us because he’s a terrific player. Harrellson is obviously getting so much more time this year because they don’t have as many big bodies. Last year the focus was on John Wall and Patrick Patterson and (Eric) Bledsoe and everybody else, but like all players, he’s waited his turn and taken full advantage of it.Question: I’m wondering how you view the league going into SEC play.Fox: There have been some losses. I think every league has that. I think it was yesterday, maybe the day before, I looked at the RPI, and I think in the top 20 of the RPI, which is going to be used by the selection committee, I think we had three teams. I don’t think – and you’d have to check this before you throw me into the fire – I don’t think there was a Pac-10 team in the top 20 and I think there was only one ACC team, and we have three from our division in there. I think it’s strong. We do have a couple losses like every league that you wish you didn’t have, but I don’t think that’s just an issue with the SEC. I think you could point to teams in every conference.Question: How is Travis Leslie doing this year and what are you looking for from him?Fox: Travis has improved. He’s a much more complete player than he was last year. He still has a spectacular play now and again, but I think he’s been much more productive in the unspectacular areas. He has really played well for us and he really worked hard for us in the offseason. I think he’s having a good year. He’s putting up pretty good numbers and we can talk about that instead of just his spectacular dunks.Question: Did his spectacular dunks kind of feed the way he played before?Fox: I don’t know if that motivated him or gave him an extra boost. I think he was really hungry in the offseason and has been throughout this year to be a more complete player. He’s rebounding the ball well. He’s a guy that has more assists than he has turnovers. He really, I think for us, been a more complete player for us, and that’s kind of one of the things we challenged him in becoming.

John CalipariQuestion: Can you give us some brief comments on your upcoming matchup with the (Georgia) Bulldogs?Calipari: Well, we play Penn tonight. Basically, we haven’t done a whole lot of scouting or film work on Georgia. I saw them against Notre Dame since we had to play Notre Dame and they’re a really good team. They’re one of those teams I talked about, and they’re proving me right, they’re 11-2. (Georgia) had Notre Dame beat (and) could be 12-1. (Georgia) had Temple beat; now all of a sudden they’re 13-0. Mark (Fox) is doing a great job at defending. They’re playing how they have to play to win games and be there so it’s going to be a tough challenge for us.Question: Can you talk about how much easier it is when you have a really good point guard? You’ve had several in a row now. Can you just talk about how much easier it is when a guy can run what you want run and get the job done for you.Calipari: Well, the one thing I want to tell you is it takes time for all those guys. I can remember Derrick Rose, we go to New York and Dick Vitale is saying, ‘He’s out of control. He’s not a point guard. He’s just shooting balls.’ And I can remember Tyreke (Evans) down in Puerto Rico having like seven charges and people coming up saying, ‘Oh my gosh.’ And even Clark Kellogg, who had us at Georgetown saying, ‘I’m not so sure.’ Even Brandon (Knight) out in Hawaii. So it takes time for those guys, especially with the way we play. But when they get it, when they feel it, then all of a sudden it changes everything for our team and that’s happening with Brandon right now. He still breaks down the offense at times. He still takes some shots he really has no business taking or turns it over in unnecessary ways, but when he gets those things in check, and he will. He’s got to defend better. He’s not defending as well as he needs to. But when he does, I think you’ll see our team take that next step up.Question: Have any of the freshmen kind of exceeded expectations at this point? And where is Terrence Jones at right now?Calipari: When I’m coaching these guys, I want people to watch my players and say, ‘I can’t believe that young man is playing that way. I didn’t know he had that in him. I didn’t know he could that.’ Our job as coaches is to bring that out of them, is to help them reach their dreams and make them understand they can do things they did not think they can do. Whether it’s Doron (Lamb), Brandon or Terrence, they’ve all stepped up and done more than most people, and even maybe I think they could do. Terrence, we’ve got to get him playing with more intensity right now in a more consistent way. We’ve got to get him more physical. What we’re doing in practice with Terrence is the minute I see him jog or get out of a stance or play half speed, I take them off the court and they get on the treadmill and then he gets back on the court. I’m just not going to let him back up anymore. I told him, ‘You’re capable of dominating games and you’re not doing it now.’ That’s because of how he practices. He’s got to develop better habits. But (he’s) a great young man. He’s gotten so much better. He’s one of the leading rebounders, if not the leading rebounder, in the SEC. As we get into league play, he’s going to find out that all this comes up a notch.Question: I’m curious how you view the SEC coming in and strength of the league.Calipari: I’m zeroed in on our half right now. The West five years ago was the dominant side and now it’s shifted a little bit over to this side. But when you’re talking about wins over Pittsburgh and Notre Dame and Villanova and Kansas State, Washington State, North Carolina – that wasn’t by us – Louisville on the road, and Xavier on the road, you’re talking about a lot of good wins. When you’re talking about our half, every game we play is going to be a hard game. That’s 10 games. You have leagues and you’ll have teams say, ‘Well, our league is this and that.’ Yeah, but you don’t play each other twice. You’re only playing that team once. And those three you’re getting at home. You’re not even having to go on the road to play them. So our strength of schedule with Florida and Tennessee and ourselves, the strength of those schedules non-conference – ours is like 15 right now. When we have to go Tennessee twice, Florida twice, South Carolina twice, Vandy, who may be the best team in the league, and Georgia, who may be right there with them, those 10 games, our schedule strength will still be in the top 15. I look at that and I say, you know, this league is going to be fine. I’m watching Vandy and I don’t even want to think about coaching in the end zone up there. And I’m watching Georgia and I’m scared to death going in there. You know Tennessee, if they can beat Pittsburgh and Villanova, they can beat anybody in the country. I really don’t know what’s going on right now (at Tennessee), but I do know that. So now all of a sudden you’re saying, Florida, they’re picked to win our league. As they figure out what they’re doing, it’s almost an impossible game to play down there. I think it’s being hyped a little bit because everyone is trying to posture for their league. We’re fine. I’m looking at our league and we’re going to be fine. I still think we’re going to get five teams in and maybe six.Question: When you talked about the other day that you gave up on Josh, is that easy for a coach to admit? And you talked about how that kind of taught you something, how will that help you with some of your other guys the rest of the year?Fox: First of all, I never said I gave up on him. I think he gave up on himself, which I didn’t try to bring anymore out of him. ‘If that’s all you have, then you’re not good enough to play here.’ That’s basically what I said. You’ve got to do this. It’s got to be two sides to this. You’ve got to have players that are on a mission to get better. What happened to Josh is he’s in the best shape of his life, and then he went in and said, ‘Man, I’m doing stuff I didn’t even know I can do.’ And he built his own confidence, his own self-esteem, and I don’t want to take credit for that. I want him to take credit for that, and I want other players to know it’s not me. Now, yes, we have to challenge guys. But the other side of it is I need to step up and look at the other guys who aren’t playing well and spend some time with those guys to help them get better. Eloy (Vargas) really needs me right now to do that, and so does Jon Hood and Stacey (Poole), so I’ve got to spend more time with those guys, understanding that they’re going to be important pieces of what we’re trying to do here. The other side of it is, I’m not a guy that likes to go 6 in the morning and have four-hour practices and beat them up. I just don’t that. But some guys need that. Josh proved that. There are some guys that need to be up at 6 in the morning conditioning to toughen them up. But Brandon Knight doesn’t need that. Neither does DeAndre. You coach individuals different. Even though you’re trying to be fair, that doesn’t mean you do the same for every kid. They’ve got to understand, it’s not punishment if you need it. You’re using this to improve yourself.