Mark Pope emphasizes the importance of NIL to UK fans. ‘You’re making all the difference.’

With all the Wildcats now in town and the first practice of the Mark Pope era set for Monday, the new-look Kentucky basketball team gathered this weekend for an important occasion off the court.

Club Blue — the UK Athletics-affiliated NIL group — held its first major event for subscribers Saturday afternoon at Alltech Arena, an opportunity for fans who have donated to the men’s basketball program to meet with Pope and the players that will make up the 2024-25 team.

“This roster, I think, is one of the special rosters in the entire country,” Pope told the crowd. “… But these guys are not here without you. We talk about this all the time, and these are not hollow words. I know Kentucky is not my team. It’s not even our players’ team. This is all of our team. And you’ll hear me say it over and over and over again: You guys have made such a huge contribution in constructing this roster. We’re super grateful for that. …

“And we can’t wait to be out on the court and show you what the return on that investment is going to be. We’re super grateful.”

The first game of the Pope era won’t be played until November, but the opening practice of the summer session for these Wildcats is scheduled for Monday, and that will provide an initial peek at the possibilities of his first UK basketball roster.

The new players, who have been arriving in Lexington over the past couple of weeks, will be allowed to practice four hours per week for eight weeks beginning Monday, and Pope is eager to see them on the court together for the first time. Amari Williams, who was actually the first transfer to UK after Pope took the job in April, was the final Wildcat to arrive on campus, coming to town this weekend following his graduation from Drexel University.

The Club Blue “New Era” event Saturday was open only to those who have subscribed to one of the organization’s NIL plans. The festivities included a Q&A session with Pope that lasted more than 30 minutes, a meet-and-greet with nearly every player on the 2024-25 roster, and free food, games and giveaways throughout the day.

Pope signed autographs throughout the afternoon and returned to the stage toward the end of the event for another Q&A session with fans. The New Era get-together is expected to be the first of many such events for Club Blue subscribers.

“Club Blue is at the heart of so much of what we’re doing,” Pope said. “And we have incredible people at Club Blue that are paving a way for us to continue to be incredibly competitive in this space. And it actually is a beautiful part of what college athletics is now. In the sense that all of us can be a part of this in a very real sense. And all of us need to be a part of this in a very real sense. And there’s nobody that can do that better than Kentucky. There’s just no fan base like ours that is devoted and willing and intentional enough to do what we can do here.”

Meeting the UK basketball players

While Pope was addressing one crowd of supporters, the UK players were scattered around the arena as other fans lined up to take pictures with the new Wildcats. The group included 10 scholarship players — everyone but Kerr Kriisa and Williams, two international players who were held out of the event due to different NIL rules for foreign players — and walk-ons Grant Darbyshire and Walker Horn, the only returnees from John Calipari’s final UK team.

A couple of the newcomers — Trent Noah and Travis Perry — are from Kentucky.

“It means a lot. It’s a huge honor,” Perry said as a line consisting of dozens of fans waited to meet him. “It’s great to get to meet and interact with all these people. I think pretty much every person has said thank you for being here. And that’s just something that you don’t get at a lot of places. That’s something that means a lot. Whether they know it or not, it means a lot to me. And I know it means a lot to the other guys.”

Everyone else on the team is new to the state. And new to the UK basketball fishbowl.

“It’s crazy,” senior guard Jaxson Robinson said of the turnout. “This event specifically — just BBN showing out, doing what they do. It’s crazy.”

Robinson, who was Pope’s leading scorer at BYU last season, and his teammates also participated in the program’s Father-Son Camp on Saturday morning. He said he understood the importance of events like this one to help build the team’s NIL profile, though he viewed Saturday’s meet-and-greet as something more.

“I think it’s deeper than that. I think Coach Pope does a good job of talking about it, but this is just one big family. And all the new guys on this campus are just now joining it,” Robinson said. “BBN’s been here before us. They know the history of the program way better than we do. But we’re slowly learning what it means to have Kentucky across our chest. So we’re excited to get out on the court and start competing.”

During his first Q&A session with the fans, Pope confirmed that UK’s game against Ohio State in the CBS Sports Classic on Dec. 21 would be played in Madison Square Garden in New York. He also said he continued to work hard to get Rick Pitino and St. John’s on the home schedule for the 2025-26 season, which will mark the 30th anniversary of the 1996 national title team that Pitino coached and Pope captained.

One fan asked Pope what the biggest game on the 2024-25 schedule would be — other than beating Arkansas in Rupp, the fan clarified, referring to Calipari’s return to Lexington. Some near him in the crowd yelled, “Duke!” Others said Louisville.

“All of ’em,” a fan yelled above the clamor.

Pope nodded.

“They’re all big here,” the UK coach said.

During his opening remarks, Pope said he was planning to send out invitations for the Club Blue subscribers to attend one practice over the next eight weeks. Later in the day, he asked a crowd around the stage if they would show up. That question was met with a loud round of confirmations.

“OK,” he said. “We’ll make that happen.”

What is Club Blue?

Club Blue is the new UK Athletics-affiliated initiative to raise NIL funds for the university’s athletes, and its New Era event Saturday at Alltech Arena was the first major men’s basketball endeavor during Pope’s tenure as the Wildcats’ head coach.

To receive an invitation to the event, fans had to sign up for one of the various Club Blue subscription plans by May 15, the deadline to gain entry to Saturday’s get-together.

Club Blue co-founder Stephen Horn told the Herald-Leader that 2,614 individuals subscribed by the cutoff date. Plans range from $25 per month to $500 per month, with the higher-priced plans featuring more benefits. In the case of the New Era event, different plans allowed for different numbers of guest passes, and Horn said 7,778 total tickets were sent out to subscribers.

Saturday marked the first formal occasion for UK basketball fans to meet Pope and the new Wildcats — all 12 scholarship players currently on the 2024-25 roster are newcomers to the program — and organizers are hoping events like this one will help further engagement between the team and the fan base.

“Most of the subscriptions are month to month, so our biggest goal (with the New Era event) is to get people to buy into the cause and how important the subscribers are to supporting NIL,” Horn said. “The last thing we want is for people to subscribe for two months, come to this event, and then cancel their subscription. We do plan to offer events at least quarterly to keep people involved. Some events will be like this one, open to any subscriber at no additional charge.”

Other events might require the purchase of a separate ticket, which would only be made available to Club Blue subscribers.

Horn said the current plan is to hold additional events in September and December.

“Not all events will be sport-specific like this one. I would envision we have a men’s basketball event, a football event and then events open to subscribers of all sports throughout the year.”

Club Blue currently offers subscriptions specific to men’s basketball, football, women’s basketball, baseball, volleyball, softball and men’s tennis, as well as an “all sports” plan.

Currently, Club Blue has $1,240,000 in annual recurring contributions for men’s basketball, if everyone stays subscribed. “We certainly hope to have a net increase in the number of subscribers coming out of this event,” Horn said.

Recent changes to the NCAA’s longstanding name, image and likeness rules have allowed athletes the opportunity to make money while actively competing in college sports. The NIL landscape continues to shift by the week — and it remains unclear what a possible final model for compensation in college athletics will look like — but it has become apparent over the past few years that universities will need robust NIL resources to compete at the highest level.

The recent college basketball transfer cycle was filled with stories of agreements that reached the high-six and even seven figures to secure commitments from players.

On Friday, former Illinois forward Coleman Hawkins — one of the biggest transfer targets this offseason — committed to Kansas State in a deal that CBS Sports reported to be worth more than $2 million for the upcoming season.

Horn said a “huge part” of his organization’s NIL work included working with individual high-level supporters of UK Athletics, but he noted that contributions from fans like the ones who subscribed to Club Blue’s plans and attended Saturday’s event were “critical” to the mission.

UK athletics director Mitch Barnhart said on April 12 — the day Pope was officially announced as the Wildcats’ new head coach — that a group of high-level donors had already pledged $4 million in NIL funds to help him get started.

Pope also addressed the importance of NIL during his introductory press conference in Rupp Arena two days later, and he appeared in videos asking UK fans to sign up for a Club Blue subscription during the lead-up to last month’s deadline for entry into Saturday’s event.

“The University of Kentucky has an advantage that no other university in the basketball world has, and that’s BBN,” he told that crowd at Saturday’s event. “And there’s a sense that that’s what’s going to put us over the edge. We have this groundswell of support that’s going to fit into this NIL world. And it’s going to go a long way to determine how successful we can be. And that’s why we’re so incredibly grateful for this group, guys. If you’ve spent one second wondering if you’re making a difference, please stop. You’re making all the difference.

“Everything we do right now, you guys are a massive part of making it possible. And us growing this group is going to be really important. And we can, because we have BBN. And that’s what this community is.”

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