Oscar the grouch
Kentucky head coach John Calipari reacts in the first half of an NCAA tournament second-round college basketball game against Western Kentucky. (March 15, 2012) Credit: AP
ATLANTA -- College basketball coaches always must navigate a generation gap with players. But when you rely on freshmen year after year, as Kentucky's John Calipari does, the challenge is even greater.
Take movies. Calipari often takes his team on a movie outing the night before a road game that is scheduled for late at night. So with Friday's game against Indiana set to begin at about 10 p.m., the Wildcats headed for a local theater Thursday.
Senior Darius Miller made the pick, as usual. He chose "21 Jump Street,'' a youth-oriented comedy that has been popular with critics and at the box office.
"The movie was awful,'' Calipari said as his players smiled and shook their heads. "They may have thought it was funny. I'm thinking I'm a 53-year-old man sitting in this movie theater watching this thing.''
Later, he added: "I should say it was awful if you're 53. If you're 20, 19, 21, it was a fun movie. There were some of the stupidest things in this movie I've ever seen. But people were laughing. I was the only one not laughing.''
Anthony Davis, Kentucky's star freshman forward, panned his coach's review.
"I don't know what Coach Cal is talking about,'' he said. "I think it was a great movie. All of us liked it. It was very funny . . . Coach Cal, I don't think he likes movies. I think he likes movies like 'Red Tails' and old Western movies.''
