Kentucky-Indiana Postgame Quotes
UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY MEN’S BASKETBALL MEDIA CONFERENCE
December 13, 2025
Lexington, Kentucky, USA
Coach Mark Pope
Press Conference
Kentucky – 72, Indiana – 60
MARK POPE: Yes. First, congratulations and thank you to Coach Skinner and the women’s volleyball team for making the final four and doing it in straight sets so everybody could make it over here in time for the Kentucky Indiana game. Coach Skinner just seems to do everything perfectly. And once again, he has done it. We are excited for those guys. I mean, I think what he’s doing is pretty much unprecedented in sport, really, he’s somewhere next to John Wooden in terms of what’s happening. It’s pretty amazing to watch those guys. A ton of love for BBN for showing out tonight. They were just unbelievable in the gym and so grateful, we never take it for granted how undying, loyal and faithful and hanging in there with us. BBN is just the greatest fan base in the world. It’s fun to start this Kentucky Indiana rivalry back up. Hit me with questions.
Q Mark, it seemed like tonight you guys had some guys knocking the rust off. That had been coming back with like Jaland Lowe tonight, Mo comes back. How much of a spark did Mo, Jaland and even Brandon tonight when you guys went on the run and took the lead?
MARK POPE: We had good stories. When you go through a ton of adversity and you get out the other side, you got a lot of good stories. It’s fun to have good stories. You know, today is Mo’s birthday. And this is a game perfectly suited for Mo. He was a lead on the defensive end. His physicality and doing it legal was elite. He was great on the glass. It was awesome to have him back. He’s such a great competitor and it’s been killing him to be out. It was great to have him back, I thought he was incredible. JLowe, there was a lot of favorite moments in the game but one of my favorite moments from the game was JLowe missed yet another uncontested lay-up and we were sitting in the time out and I was like, hey, that just means you are one closer to the make man, be hyped about it. You are just one closer to making one. What was great, that comment wasn’t great. What was great was that he was sitting to my left and his four teammates sitting in the chairs turned to him and said exactly the same thing. They all jumped and said shoot it man, let’s go, let’s go, let’s go. And then of course, you know, the first shot he makes after missing all of the shots that I preach and teach and talk about is the step back 15 footer. So, go figure. But it was fun to see his competitive spirit come through tonight and Brandon Garrison, you know, our job is to win, our job is to win. In some respects, nothing matters besides us winning. That is our job. But in the process, watching guys grow is pretty awesome. I was really proud of BG tonight.
Q Mark, right here. This summer you talked about laying the foundation defensively. Tonight 18 forced turnovers, there have been flashes up to this point. Can you just talk about that and also the effort on the defensive end, it looks like that picked up in both areas?
MARK POPE: This Indiana team just scored 113 points against a really good Penn State team. They are a potent offensive force. I think they started the season scoring 100 points every game it seemed like. And I actually love watching them on film. They are so smart and they confuse you so much. With slips and peels and screens and double screens and slips to flairs and they combine all these actions and it’s really not playcalling. It’s the guys, the coach has done a great job about teaching those guys how to get to all that stuff in the floor of the offense. We knew we had a huge challenge and I was really proud of our communication tonight. I thought the guys really, really were trying to fly around and I thought they did a good job communicating. I thought Coach Fox had the, I thought he did a terrific job preparing our guys.
Q Coach, there were a couple of times tonight where it would be second, third, fourth, fifth, even fifth chance to get the ball into the basket and get those points. How important was that effort in having that momentum shift during the second half?
MARK POPE: Yeah, it was 14 offensive rebounds for 18 points, in a slow game. It was such a slow game. It was foul ridden. Just walking up game. We could never get the pace to the game. Credit Indiana for that. It was the whole game. You know, stories unfold, ironically, as a staff we have been really frustrated about our ineffectiveness wedging. It’s one of our three 100% that we track every day. We’ve been dealing with a lot of internal conversations and frustration and we just haven’t been very successful on the glass in a while. To the point where the guys were frustrated. We do wedge corrections every single days of last days practice and last days games and they were being halfhearted or whatever. And finally coach Fueger, who is in charge of that part of our team, that metric, lost his mind in the film session. I mean lost his mind like I’ve never seen him, I’ve been with him for like 60 years and he just lost his mind. It’s fun to see these guys embrace the idea that we wedge to win, we don’t wedge to do a job or fulfill a quota, we wedge to win. Certainly, without our work on the offensive glass, we were not a pretty offensive team tonight. And so you take away offensive glass, we have no chance to be in this game. And so these guys offensive rebound to win the game.
Q Mark, next time I’m struggling to write a story, can you come yell at me and maybe break a clipboard. I’m curious, Brandon, the way people talk about the younger people nowadays, could have gone the opposite direction when you line into him. How confident were you he wouldn’t and what about the process can you walk through that?
MARK POPE: I don’t think you are ever really confident. I actually don’t like, I don’t want to make a bigger deal of anything than it was. It’s not, you can’t burn hot all the time, I don’t think as a coach now. But I think there’s times where you are kind of left with nothing else a little bit. And you’re exactly right, that’s the tough thing. I wish I could tell you I know how every player is going to react to every confrontation or conversation I have with them, but you don’t, it’s just like your children, you don’t. So, I’m left with just real pride. Like BG’s mom should be really proud. His inner circle should be really proud. Because there’s something inside him. I think we talked about at the press conference, maybe. There’s something inside him, listen, there’s no way to hide from any spotlight here at Kentucky. Every single little moment of our game and interactions is blown up. Which is one of the great things about this place. There were 100 reasons why BG could have gone to the corner and complained to a teammate or called out to coaches or hung up his jersey or come be a pouty guy in practice. There were 100 reasons why that could have been his reaction. But due to what’s inside him and how he wants to be a father example to his son and how he wants to make his mom proud and how badly he wants to be successful. In the process of him growing up to be, hopefully a great man, which hopefully he can do. That would be worth everything. He showed up to practice and we go through practice and he has a great practice and we don’t do a ton of conditioning in the practice. But this day we did. On his own he won every sprint, outsprinted every guard, every single person. I didn’t tell him to do that. I did not pre-prep him to do that. That was just his response. We don’t always respond the right way, but he responded the right way and I’m super proud of him. I’m happy for him. And our job is to win, that’s it. But those things are really special to me. They are really special. That’s going to be in his pocket. That’s going to be a little part of his DNA. It doesn’t mean he’s going to respond right all the time but there’s a way better chance next time in life, in basketball, in whatever. He’s going to have a chance to respond better and that’s how you become a great man. It’s pretty cool.
Q Mark, when it comes to your all’s offensive flow, what kind of difference do you see when Jaland is on the floor?
MARK POPE: I mean, we are not a thing of beauty right now. Actually, that’s not true. I actually thought it was beautiful tonight. The relentless force was beautiful. But there’s not a lot of pretty offense out there. We are still trying to find ourselves. JLowe helps us, thought it was great with drive lines and great with KD and a incredibly physical game. I thought our guys were ordinary in the gap. We talk about winning the gap all the time and that’s one of the things Indiana does great. That’s the way they turn you over is you go in the gap and they kind of sucked everybody in there and it’s all hands on the ball. I think for the game, guys we had 4 turnovers which is incredible. We didn’t make any shots, right? And so just kind of like this mucky forced inside game and I thought JLowe was really terrific for the most part. Being able to re-attack and re-attack and re-attack use the – and use the CL screen and kinda find a was to actually makes some things happen. Once he gets his rhythm back and makes some of those bunnies, he would have had a really impactful, impactful game.
Q Mark, to follow up on all the questions about the offense and I know you love numbers so I will throw 2 at you. One, this is the fewest points you’ve scored in a win here and also was the worst shooting percentage in a win here. For you, just how important was it for this teams psyche that on a night the shots were just not falling, you guys just out gritted them?
MARK POPE: I think we are probably somewhere in that space. I have a pretty good sense of, I don’t know if you guess how things are going to go but once you start down a path, I think you have a pretty good sense of how you dig yourself out. And the chances of us playing a game right now where we are just firing on all cylinders and making every shot. That’s probably not where we are in our confidence and courage and spirit right now. Right now, like to tip the needle and bring back some belief and consolidate ourselves as a team. It’s probably going to be like gross, beautiful basketball like it was tonight. So it’s important. I think this is probably how we had to find our way, probably not the last time we have to find our way this way but that’s okay, because our guys can do it.
Q DeMarcus Cousins obviously Tweeted after the Gonzaga loss that he felt like the team was playing with no heart. Tonight felt a little bit different. You had guys diving on the floor and more scrappy. How do you assess the shift that the team has made in heart?
MARK POPE: Listen. I don’t shy away from the truth, even when it hurts. You might as well own it, so we try to own it as a team. We talked about it. Listen. This is no time to deflect comments like that from people who loves this program. DeMarcus loves this program. He is proud of this place. He wants these guys to represent. So, you own it. You know we’ve had a lot of conversations with the team about, guys, this is actually what we are putting on the court right now. And I think the quicker you own it, the quicker that you can change it. I couldn’t be more proud of the way these guys won the game tonight because it was ugly and full of heart and intensity. We finished the half and there was no energy in the gym and no energy and there was mucked up foul ridden slow as molasses game and we were down 7. And these guys just had to go self create the energy in the defensive end and on the glass. So, I’m really happy with the guys. And you know, we just got to move onto the next effort. We have to embrace this personality for a while, I think. I do think we have a chance to grow into an elite offensive team. I just don’t think it’s gonna happen tomorrow.
Q Coach, kind of more on that second half. You go in down 7 and there was some scattered boos and the building is kinda shaken up. Can you just talk about the team responding to adversity.
MARK POPE: Like I said, I’m really proud of the guys. We talked about it all week and one of the things that we have been disappointed in is in high level games we have been very poor in our response to adversity. We just haven’t rallied around each other. We’ve had some go away instead of dig in and I thought that was the opposite tonight. We are going to need to continue to practice that, it’s actually a practice skill and we are going to need to continue to talk about it and make it a real thing so that when it happens, it’s not a surprise and we know how we are going to react. We had guys step up and help. You know, I will tell you what, this Otega Oweh, anyway, so I was proud of the guys and that’s where we are going to have to live. It’s cool. I love living here, this is awesome.
Q Mark, obviously, there has been talk in shortening the rotation a little bit. We did not see Jelavic on the court today and is that sorting the rotation or is there something more there?
MARK POPE: I actually had no idea where the rotation was going to go today. I didn’t know how Kam was going to feel on the court today and I had no idea how Mo was going to feel on the court today. I did feel like there was space for Jelavic to be really effective in this game and I felt like it made sense and he’s our most effective post player especially at the 4 and this mucked up game kind of felt that way. The game just kind of told us where to go and the guys responded pretty well. I expect Jela is going to help us in the future for sure. Collin had a little bit less rotation and Jasper had a little bit shorter rotation after being our leading scorer last game and Trent maybe had a little bit of shorter rotation. But that’s the nature of the game and what the game was calling for tonight. If we can embrace that we can win a lot of different ways.
Q Coach, you had some concerns about the teams competitiveness how the last couple of weeks. How much of that that change was due to Jaland coming back and it Mo coming back or was it the whole team flipping a switch?
MARK POPE: It takes all of us. I think it’s all of the things and we dipped our toe in it and now we got to double down. We’ve got to double down and see if, you know, the nice thing about a season is that the whole, like every day we tell a defining story about what a team is. So in a day, we say this team is this or this team is that. And that is the fans job and thats media’s job, right? Is to make an evaluation of the team. But as the team in the inner circle, we are work in progress, we know that. We know where we were yesterday but that does not mean that we are going to be that today. In fact, if we were the same thing we were yesterday, then what are we doing with the season, right? We are excited to grow these guys, we have to grow and we have to get a lot better, and we will.
Q Coach, on that note. Growth can be messy and it can be loud, especially with young men. Playing at Kentucky. These young men have a big spotlight on them. Do you find that you are really trying to clarify the difference between struggle and failure with them? Because they can get in their own heads, especially with the amount of pressure on them to win here?
MARK POPE: Listen. We are tight, we are tight. We only shot 15 3s today. And we were 3 for 15. We are tight. It’s okay. That’s actually a part of basketball. I don’t love the players, like I go make fun of a guy because you got nervous and you got scared. There’s those guys that’s like nah, I never get scared. C’mon man, what are we talking about. We all get scared, we all get nervous, own it and let’s grow from it, right? We are a little tight right now but we are going to get great, man. We will be relentless and we will will ourselves into playing some great basketball. And we just willed ourselves into a win tonight. That is what we had to do, that’s what we have to do right now. If we do that enough, then all of a sudden we are going to have some belief that we can win this way and things are going to loosen up a little bit. That is just a process. It’s not rocket science. If you’ve been around sports, you know it’s the process. That’s where we are right now. We have the guys to do it. All right. Thanks.
KENTUCKY BASKETBALL POSTGAME QUOTES
KENTUCKY VS. INDIANA
RUPP ARENA – LEXINGTON, KY.
DECEMBER 13, 2025
KENTUCKY PLAYERS
#10, Brandon Garrison, F
On mindset change after Tuesdays game…
“It’s just a part basketball. I made a mistake, you know? I feel like I handled it the right way. I didn’t let it bring me down. I came out and responded well.”
On his feelings towards the fans getting behind him…
“Yeah, BBN’s always there for us. But it was amazing tonight, you know, loud. But they always show out for us.”
On what was going through his head when it came to adversity in the game…
“Just next play mentality. I try not to stay on that topic. I feel like if you have a positive mindset, people feel like this happens.”
On his thoughts on his favorite memory during the game tonight…
“I’ll say, the offensive rebound, just because, our guys, support each other, have our backs, you know, for the rebound, we came out with a big bucket.”
#15 Jaland Lowe, G
How did you feel about your contribution…
“I did alright. I’m really rusty out there. I am trying to get that off as quickly as possible, but I just wanted to bring a lot of energy. My guys know what to expect from me and just trying to be a leader on the court. Just show up in ways that contribute to winning at all costs.”
On how his shoulder feels…
“My shoulder feels amazing. It’s the best it can be, that’s all I can really say. Feels the best it can be right now.”
On his confidence level with his shoulder…
“Yeah, I’m not going to go out there unless I do feel confident. So, if I’m out there I feel pretty good.”
How did you guys need a win like this…
“What’s the worst possible way to need a win? We absolutely need this tonight, just to show that we have the fight in us and that we’re capable of doing this. It’s been rocky and hard for us so far in this journey but just showing these guys that we can show up and do it in every aspect tonight is huge for us.”
#23, Mouhamed Dioubate, F
On being back…
“It’s feels great. There is nothing like playing with my brothers. It feels good to have joy after a big game and we want to keep doing that.”
On being out for the month…
“It sucks; I’m not going to lie. Just doing rehab trying to get better. It was games that we lost that I feel like I could have helped change the results, but I couldn’t do anything about it. I just hope to keep this same energy going forward.”
On being the energizer of the team…
“I always had that to my game, just bringing energy. No matter where I played, I have always had that spark. Once I committed, I knew I would be bringing that to the team. I just try to make it contagious. Like today, it was very contagious. Everyone was playing to that standard. We just need to keep doing that moving forward.”
On tonight being his game…
“I mean it’s my birthday. That would be the worst thing to lose on my birthday. I told the guys before the game, don’t get me a gift, let’s just win the game for my birthday. We got it done. Every game day is going to be my birthday.”
INDIANA HEAD COACH DARIAN DEVRIES
On Indiana’s offense recently…
“I thought in the first half, we got some pretty good action, pretty good movement. I thought the second half, Kentucky certainly turned up the pressure and was able to get into us and we didn’t respond well enough, and we turned the ball over too much and turnovers against them are really hard because now they’re out in transition playing space, so the turnovers and offensive rebounding, that flipped the game around in the second half.”
On the turnovers in such a short stretch…
“The turnovers were a combination of things that I thought we left our feet a few times, and I thought we just got on our heels a little bit and didn’t play as disciplined as we needed to. The crowd got cranked up, and that’s the time where you really got to dig into your screens a bit more. You got to play off two feet more and then the offensive rebounds. We didn’t do a good enough job of creating space and getting bodies and going and securing the ball.”
On team improvements and ball pressure…
“When you get ball pressure, everything is from an execution standpoint, things have to be done with more force. You can’t continue to just get pushed out and then everybody stands, so you have to find ways to give yourself up with the screen and set up those screens with more force and get some movement, and even when they got ahead and we started to break it off a little bit. Once we got moving again, we were able to get those clean, better looks, so in some way we got to get better.”
On what went wrong offensively that let Kentucky back in the game…
“I don’t remember the exact sequence there, but not having Lamar (Wilkerson) out there was certainly a big part of our offense and you know his fouls certainly limited him with only 20 minutes and he was again a big focal piece of what we try to run an offense through, so I believe during that stretch that he wasn’t out there was when the turnovers were starting to happen and we weren’t able to do some of our actions.”
INDIANA PLAYERS
#12, Tucker DeVries, F
On why the shots didn’t go down like they normally do…
“To be honest, making and missing shots tonight, I honestly didn’t think was our problem. Some of our guys weren’t shooting great, and as a team we didn’t shoot that great either, but even with that being said, I think there are certain areas that we need to be a lot better at as a group. Especially in the second half, I think that would have made up for some of those shooting habits and miscommunication.”
On what the problem was if not the shots…
“Four turnovers is far too many and as a group, when they pick up the pressure, I think we just really need to focus on our execution a little bit more.”
