Former Kentucky great Dan Issel makes waves with some recent comments
In a recent interview, Kentucky Wildcats basketball legend Dan Issel made some comments that got fans talking.
The Kentucky Wildcats and, in particular, coach Mark Pope have been thoroughly criticized from every corner of the internet about the failures in recruiting this offseason. After being spurned by Tyran Stokes , Kentucky was left without a single top 100 player in this class, and then they missed on multiple top players in the transfer portal as well. Fans have made their displeasure known while other fan bases has reveled in the issues they've had.
There have been a number theories as to why the Wildcats and Pope have struggled to attract top talents to Lexington. Everything from rowdy fans to Pope's "weirdness" has been called into question. Former Kentucky star Dan Issel had a simpler, and more direct explanation.
On a recent appearance on Fanduel's Run It Back podcast , he was asked about Kentucky's inability to compete, and gave an unexpected answer. With NIL, we can’t cheat like we used to. Now, it should be noted that Issel was laughing as he said it, and even added that "I was hoping Boogie (DeMarcus Cousins) was on the show because we need him to kick in more NIL money and help us out a little bit.
However, the answer still blew up on social media. His explanation did underscore an overall truth about where college basketball is. NIL has resulted in the spread of talent to a larger number of schools.