Kentucky is working swiftly to appoint Scott Drew of Baylor as the new basketball coach of the Wildcats.

The attention around Scott Drew of Baylor as the University of Kentucky men’s basketball coach has grown in the less than 24 hours after the departure of John Calipari.
Shortly after Calipari announced his resignation as the Wildcats’ head coach on Tuesday afternoon, the Herald-Leader was informed that UK had significant negotiations with Drew.

A aircraft registered to JC Land LLC, a firm owned by Joe Craft, according to corporate papers filed with the Kentucky Secretary of State, took off for the Waco region on Wednesday morning. Later on Wednesday morning, the plane was returning to central Kentucky, and it touched down in Georgetown just before midday. Ahead of the trip, television news teams had assembled at Lexington’s Blue Grass Airport.
Craft is a significant benefactor to the institution and one of UK Athletics’ greatest supporters.
Although the same plane returned to the Waco area on Wednesday night, KWTX-TV, the CBS affiliate in Waco, confirmed that members of Drew’s family were on the flight and had been in Lexington earlier in the day. Drew, who spent the previous 21 seasons at Baylor and won the 2021 national championship, was not on the flight to central Kentucky.
The Baylor coach has not publicly said if he would be interested in the UK position. As anticipated, Drew has emerged as the front-runner to succeed Calipari as Kentucky’s basketball coach. Drew has long been considered athletics director Mitch Barnhart’s preferred option to take over as head coach.
As midnight drew near, there was still no formal agreement in place for Drew to take over the Wildcats’ program, and by then, it seemed unlikely that a decision would be made until Thursday at the latest. However, it looked as though an announcement that Drew would be the next head coach at UK could happen as soon as Wednesday.
In the midst of growing rumors that he would take over as the next head coach of the UK, Drew shared a picture of himself eating lunch in Waco on Wednesday afternoon with Eric Shero, a prominent Baylor Athletics fan and banking businessman. He did not specifically mention the Kentucky basketball position in his article.
Drew said on X, “Great lunch spot in Waco on a rainy day.” “Alliance Bank and Eric Shero are the best friends and supporters!”
The 53-year-old Drew started his coaching career under his father, Homer Drew, at Valparaiso. He guided the team there for one season before taking over at Baylor in 2003, when he took over a scandal-plagued program at a school with a short basketball success history.
Even though the previous coaching staff saddled the Bears with years of debilitating NCAA fines, Drew quickly elevated the team to a perennial national contender. In his fifth season, they made it to the NCAA Tournament, which was just Baylor’s second tournament participation in 58 years and its first March Madness trip in 20 years. Two years later, they guided the squad to the Elite Eight.
In 2021, when Barnhart was serving as the head of the NCAA Tournament selection committee, Baylor earned their first-ever national championship. With the Bears, Drew has a 446-244 record. Of the team’s 16 NCAA Tournament trips, 12 have been under his direction.
Once it became apparent that Calipari, who was named the next coach at Arkansas on Wednesday morning, would not be returning to Lexington for a 16th season, a number of well-known individuals were mentioned as potential candidates for the Kentucky position.
Though Dan Hurley of UConn, Billy Donovan of the Chicago Bulls, and Nate Oats of Alabama were considered as possible possibilities for the UK post, Drew was considered the front-runner in the background, even prior to Calipari’s formal announcement of his resignation.
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