Mark Pope learned not to panic if a team was not making shots from NBA Hall of Fame coach George Karl

Kentucky coach Mark Pope wants his team to shoot 3-pointers. He also wants the players to make 3-point shots but if they do not, he’s not going to panic and have any player quit taking open 3-pointers.

He learned the importance of patience with 3-point shooters from former NBA coach George Karl, a Hall of Famer who won more than 1,000 NBA games.

“One of the best basketball minds, or one of the people in basketball that I look up to and admire and learned so much from, was George Karl,” said Pope. “I got to play for Coach two different times, two different teams.

“I think, technically, he fired me twice, but Coach had this incredible ability to not be a scoreboard watcher.”

Karl never hit the panic button if his team was not making shots early.

“You could go into the second media timeout and it could be 26-11, and everybody’s really fretting, but he’s like, ‘No, no, we’re fine, guys. The energy in this gym is right. We’re actually playing right. Like, everything we’re doing is right. We’re executing. We’re seeing the game. It’s just some things haven’t gone our way, but if we kind of stay on this path we’re on it’ll be good,’” Pope said.

The best thing about Karl is that he did not change if his team was hitting shots.

“He’d be like, ‘All right, listen, guys, we’re not right. Don’t get tricked by this scoreboard. We just made some ridiculous shots  And this is not quite right,’” Pope recalled.

“ I thought he was brilliant at not being a scoreboard watcher, but being an energy reader, and I actually think the game asks us for that. The game is asking us to, don’t be distracted.”