[Hoot Gibson]

Great coaches find a way to win, even when their team is less talented than their opponent. Compare this year's UK team's talent to the 5 seed 2009-10 or the 8 seed 2010 Butler Buldog teams that were NCAA tournament runners up (Brad Stevens' third and fourth seasons as a college head coach). Brad Stevens was a great college coach and he is a great NBA coach.

John Calipari is a great recruiter who is now being out recruited by Mike Krzyzewski, who also happens to be a great coach with five national championships to his credit.

Coach Calipari is not a great coach, IMO, and he is certainly wildly overpaid, but he does not deserve to be fired. UK fans just need to lower their expectations and get used to the new normal of making the tournament in most seasons without having much of a chance of winning it.

To paraphrase Terry Malloy in "On the Waterfront," we could have been a contender.