NO REASON FOR CALIPARI TO REMAIN AT KENTUCKY, WHERE ONE MEANS DONE

He has lost four of his last five NCAA tournament games and stopped feeding the NBA with quick-stay talent — Booker, Davis, Towns, Murray, Fox — while a stunning loss to Oakland means he should leave

     His one-and-done rationale is crumpled, allowing us to examine the lost cause with a new and cheapened meaning. John Calipari fell in the first round of the NCAA tournament Thursday night to the Oakland Golden Grizzlies, whose coach almost died, and now has lost four of his last five games in March. At one point, the affair brought him one national championship and four Final Four berths.

     Now, with a buyout of $33.3 million, he should be dismissed as Kentucky’s coach. You may bring up Devin Booker, Karl-Anthony Towns, Anthony Davis, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, De’Aaron Fox, Jamal Murray, Bam Adebayo, Tyrese Maxey, Julius Randle, Tyler Herro, John Wall and DeMarcus Cousins. And you are correct, that nucleus of unconscionable talent separating Calipari from other college basketball coaches in the previous decade.

     But staring at the media all dressed in blue, with a pocket square and his hair in a backward mode, he hardly was the suitcase-carrying enterpriser who bastardized the system and created an evolving league for the NBA. No longer is he a god, when so many future pro stars are preparing overseas and with developmental programs. These days, he hasn’t reached an Elite Eight since 2019, hasn’t won an SEC title since 2018, choked against St. Peter’s in 2022 and lost to Kansas State last year. Now he departs his hometown, Pittsburgh, with a loss to the 14th-seeded Golden Grizzlies, who received 10 three-pointers from Jack Gohlke and rewarded Greg Kampe with a victory in his 40th year of coaching.

     One-and-done.

     Assuming he survives, Calipari will approach fresh ways of forming his roster at 65. He has made enough money for a dozen lifetimes. The commonwealth includes doggery that will bite him until he leaves. Might he want to retire?

     “I’ve done this with young teams my whole career, and it's going to be hard for me to change because we've helped so many young people and their families. I don't see myself just saying, ‘OK, we're not going to recruit freshmen,’ ’’ Calipari said. “I'll look at other ways we can do stuff, but, you know, there's — this thing here, a different animal. We've been able to help so many kids and win so many games and Final Fours, national titles and all this stuff, win league championships with young guys.

     "It's changed on us. All of a sudden, it's gotten really old. So we're playing teams when our average age is 19, their average age is 24 and 25. So do I change because of that? Maybe add a couple older guys to supplement.”

     Only Tom Izzo and Bill Self, still going after one round, qualify as coaching juju in a sport that has lost Mike Krzyzewski, Roy Williams, Jay Wright, John Beilein and Jim Boeheim in recent seasons. Calipari has been so brash and revolting through time that the rush to exterminate him will be strong among media. We have lost patience with Virginia’s Tony Bennett, who has forgotten the simplest offensive symmetry since winning a title in 2019. Calipari also should leave amid massive changes in college sports, which could impact the size of the tournament and how many non-majors aren’t invited. If nothing else, the success of Oakland and Duquesne should remind power administrators about America’s buzz. Men who’ve ruled the game no longer can last beyond a down season.

     “I told them after, this one is painful,” Calipari said. “And the reason is, there are other times you lose a game and you know your team is what it is. But this team, I really felt was built for this moment. Our team and our season shouldn’t be defined by that game. But it will be. This is the profession we’ve chosen.”

     And he still throws underachieving players beneath a bus, such as Reed Sheppard, Rob Dillingham and DJ Wagner. Cal doesn’t change, even when the results do. “We had some guys that didn’t play the way they’ve been playing all year,” he said. “We did everything we could. We missed shots we don’t miss. The preparation, I thought they were in a great — trying to keep ’em loose. But when the game started, you had some guys not playing to the level they can play.” His complaint would be a reflection on the head coach.

     A longtime friend, Kampe, will carry on against North Carolina State. Seven years ago, he prepared to enter a hospital for a kidney stone operation when he developed a 106-degree fever. Nurses used ice water to save him. Amazing how he’ll coach into his 70s when Calipari could be a goner.

     “We just win close games,” Kampe said.

     “We’re not a Cinderella,” said Gohlke, who is 24.

     Life has become so rough for Calipari that Oakland’s victory was shown on Delta Center screens in Salt Lake City — while Gonzaga was playing McNeese. Mark Few was among those who complained. “I appreciate you saying ‘talked’ to them about it. Let's go with that description because, yeah, I just thought — we don't need that,” the Gonzaga coach said. “It's the NCAA tournament. These kids are involved. It's the biggest game of their lives. Those officials, you know, it's a big moment for them.

     “Everybody just needs to enjoy the game at hand. It doesn't need to be like the Few house where we're flipping channels every 15 seconds and not watching the show we're supposed to be watching. I mean, the McNeese people were there to watch McNeese; Gonzaga people were there to watch Gonzaga. It's the NCAA tournament. If you can't get entertained, then get out and let's get somebody else in your seat. Plain and simple.”

     Might he be a TV analyst, like Wright? The sport could use Calipari’s aggressive language as reconfigured conferences begin play. What we know is this: He must be anywhere but boarding another fast jet at the Lexington airport.

     One-and-done means farce-and-fired.

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     Jay Mariotti, called “without question the most impacting Chicago sportswriter of the past quarter-century,’’ writes general sports columns for Substack while appearing on some of the 1,678,498 podcasts and shows in production today. He is an accomplished columnist, TV panelist and talk/podcast host. Living in Los Angeles, he gravitated by osmosis to film projects.