Mark Pope now believes summer trip is unlikely for Kentucky

Kentucky was previously scheduled to travel to Israel this summer for the program’s foreign basketball tour — similar to the Wildcats’ recent trips to the Bahamas and Canada over the last decade-plus. Mark Pope teased the “epic” adventure as “somewhere that I’ve never been that I would absolutely love to go visit and spend some time.”

Then it was called off, forcing UK to pivot at the eleventh hour. The third-year coach even asked for suggestions on where the team should go once Jerusalem fell through.

“We had a trip scheduled to Jerusalem. It got canceled due to the conflict,” Pope said earlier this month. “So now we’re looking for another venue and I’m taking suggestions. Hit me up, BBN.”

Fast forward three weeks, and it does not appear the Wildcats are trending toward a breakthrough on a replacement trip. With so much to schedule on short notice, just two months before they’d leave the country, Pope says it’s unlikely they can pull it off.

He didn’t totally rule it out, but he certainly didn’t inspire much confidence.

“We’re probably a lean towards not going right now,” Pope told Darrell Bird of The Cats’ Pause on Tuesday at the SEC Spring Meetings in Destin. “Less inclined to go right now (due to Israel trip falling through). We’ll see.”

Pope previously talked about the importance of taking these summer tours — his 1996 national championship squad had its own five-game trip in Italy, one that saw the Wildcats go 4-1 with wins over Cagiva Varese, Venice River, Russia Dynamo and Siena while taking a loss to Montecatini in August 1995.

“It’s so good for teams. It’s an unbelievable experience for these young people,” he said. “It helps bind your team together, so we’re excited about it.”

The hope was for this group to experience something similar this offseason going into a massive third year for Pope in Lexington. Now, it appears those plans have been scrapped and a replacement trip is likely off the table at this stage.