john calipari, while speaking at The Summit leadership luncheon at Cross Church, traced many of his recruiting and staff-building philosophies back to Pat Nardelli.
You have no idea who Pat Nardelli is,” he said.
Nardelli is someone Calipari knew in his youth. He gave a high school Calipari and his friends pizza dinners and other things as they grew into adulthood. Nardelli was the owner of a nearby strip mall — “We thought he was the wealthiest guy in the world,” Calipari said.
Calipari and Nardelli went to lunch shortly after the former took the Massachusetts head coaching job when was 28 years old — “I think,” he said.
Nardelli, once looked at through a younger Calipari’s eyes as the pinnacle of business and wealth, gave him advice on leadership and business.
“You can have a bad deal with good people because stuff happens,” Nardelli told him. “But you can never have a good deal with bad people.
“I don’t care what it smells like, what it looks like. You make sure everybody that you bring in the organization is good people and then you’ll be fine.”
“I’ll be honest with you,” Calipari said, “I’ve lived by that.”
He told the story in response to a question about hiring assistant coaches, but it also applied to recruiting.
Calipari told some of the same stories he has at previous speaking engagements — joking about not having a team or schedule hen he was first hired, the “no drinking, clubbing, chasing, smoking” lecture with recruits and the time he was ejected from a game at Bud Walton Arena. But he also gave insights into what he looks for on the recruiting trail, which harkened back to his lunch with Nardelli.
When on a visit, Calipari said the first thing he looks at is a player’s interaction with their family — mother, father, grandmother.
“I’ve walked out of homes where a young man disrespected his mom or grandmother,” he said. “I’m out. Why am I out? If he can’t respect that woman, is he ever going to respect me? No.”
Winning is the most important element. Calipari talked about building UMass with high school players who won state championships or players who lost in those games but showed how much they cared in defeat.
He went into how players worked in a team, saying he wouldn’t take guys who play like they’re in a pickup game.
“I’m not promising all you something. You’ve got to come in here and work, you’ve got to take what you want,” Calipari said. “We’re looking for that. … I would just tell you that you want that, what’s really important, that they’ll do right. If they screw up, I’m not throwing them under the bus.”
Calipari highlighted players he coached who have had success in the NBA and overseas. He shouted out his players for making “$5 billion” in the NBA and others for having success in other fields.
He spoke about some of his former players — Devin Booker, Anthony Davis, Karl-Anthony Towns, John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins — winning the NBA Community Assist Award in the past. Calipari mentioned Michael Kidd-Gilchrist’s work in passing legislation in different states to get stuttering treatment covered by insurance, and this year’s team working with Samaritan’s Feet for the upcoming.
“You’re trying to teach these young people joy,” Calipari said. “Joy is not what you’re doing for you. You create joy when you’re doing stuff for other people.”
That, in turn, makes the team better.
Calipari gave a view into how he’s built teams, with the philosophy coming from a lunch with “the wealthiest guy in the world” in Nardelli.
“All I did was moved headquarters from Lexington to Fayetteville,” he said. “You just got to make sure we’re doing what you will be doing at the next level. How we play, how we teach — all those things.”