On Thursday afternoon, things got flipped upside down in the Joe Craft Center at the University of Kentucky. The media became the athletes, and the athletes became the media.
Mark Pope raised the idea on August 7 that the media should get a chance to live like a basketball player for a day by going through basketball drills and even representing their employers by facing off against other media outlets to be crowned the champion of Media Madness. And once that was done, the players on the Kentucky men’s basketball team would flip the script and ask media postgame questions about how they played, what they thought, and more.
The day started with the media being allowed behind the scenes to see how the sausage is made, so to speak, with Kentucky Basketball by going into the Joe Craft Center to get our eyes on the 2026-27 roster.
First, I must start with some practice thoughts, even though we eventually got kicked out for being too loud (Sorry, Coach). The practice was missing a few pieces, with Milan Momcilovic, Trent Noah, and Kam Williams sidelined with minor injuries or still recovering.
The players who stood out to me for various reasons were: Franck Kepnang, Mason Williams, Malachi Moreno, and Alex Wilkins.
For Kepnang, the second you walk in the door, he catches your eye. He is the biggest, largest, and strongest player out there, but also brings high-flying ability to jam home dunks on pick-and-rolls, and it is absolutely terrifying to see if you’re on the defensive side.
Williams simply gets things done with a ton of energy. He knocks down shot after shot, using his strong build to attack the paint and create for others. I think Williams will get more run this year than people realize, and it was nice to finally see him after hearing interesting nuggets about the 4-star freshman all summer.
Moreno is expected to take a leap forward, and Big Blue Nation hopes it’s a huge one that leads to cutting down nets in the NCAA Tournament. As for what we could see in this practice, Moreno was a force at the rim on both sides of the floor. He’s also gotten much thicker, in the best way possible, showing that the offseason work has paid off for the Kentucky kid.
Wilkins is as smooth as they come. Pope mentioned in an interview that Wilkins’ game is comparable to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, and the shoe fits. He is crafty, and almost looks like he’s going half-speed or not even trying, but still does some amazing things with the ball in his hands. The Furman transfer also looks super comfortable shooting from wherever on the court, with him displaying some deep 3s.
Once practice was over, the real fun began.
We started the day with Kentucky’s strength and conditioning coach Randy Towner getting us stretched out in preparation for the day. We then split into our assigned groups. A Sea of Blue was placed in Group 3, which put us with Alex Wilkins, Ousmane N’Diaye, and Coach Mikhail McLean.
We started with a series of defensive drills, got locked in on the defensive side, then moved into passing, followed by shooting drills and a shooting competition against the other groups.
After all the drills, we were put into an eight-team single-elimination bracket. A Sea of Blue drew JMI in the first round, and we lost 3-2 in a six-minute running-clock game.
In our consolation game, we came away with a victory against the Kentucky Kernel.
Following that game, we all moved to the sideline to watch the championship game between KSR and JMI. KSR, led by MVP Mario Maitland, would go on to dominate the game 7-2 and, hypothetically, cut down the nets.
After all the games and basketball action, the media and players walked into the Historic Memorial Coliseum media room to answer postgame questions. One representative from each media outlet sat up on the stage — shoutout to Tristan Pharis for us — and got asked questions from players and other media members.
The questions were like, “What could you and your team have done better out there?” “What is your least favorite thing that athletes do?” or “Who on this year’s team is the easiest and hardest to interview?”, which brought some fun answers from the media members.
Overall, this was a huge success in my opinion. Credit to Kentucky and the men’s basketball team for running this event with around 75 media members all in the Joe Craft Center at once. I was honored to be part of such a fun event, and Pope, along with others, shared their gratitude to the media for the hard work that goes into this lifestyle.
I haven’t always been in the shoes of a media member, but I have wanted to be, and I’ve enjoyed watching content that media members put out about things I hoped to do someday. So, if you’re in those shoes, or maybe you’re a media member reading this who just wants to find yourself in the video, I made a vlog from the day and included as much as I was able/allowed to. I hope you enjoy!
