5 reasons why John Calipari's Arkansas transition will create seismic shifts in college basketball landscape 

It has been reported that the Arkansas Razorbacks have hirer John Calipari of the Kentucky Wildcats with a massive five-year contract. With that massive news, the college basketball world changed. Let's take a look at five reasons why this will change college basketball going forward.

5 Reasons why John Calipari's Arkansas move will create a massive shift in college basketball

#1: SEC basketball is back on the map

The Southeastern Conference is notable for football, but now they have another top head coach in the men's basketball sphere. In addition to John Calipari, they have programs like the Alabama Crimson Tide, Tennessee Volunteers, Florida Gators, and South Carolina Gamecocks. Of course, they still have the Kentucky Wildcats in the conference, but the SEC has gotten significantly deeper as a result.

#2: The contract is going to elevate some more coaches' salaries

John Calipari is not leaving the University of Kentucky for cheap. With the contract figure that he commands, that is only going to be used in the next negotiation for a coach's salary and continue to elevate. The coaching circles are going to thank him for this as salaries are going to go up as a result.

#3: This gives the opportunity for Kentucky to move on

Kentucky feels like they were ready to move on from coach John Calipari and begin to move forward as a program. Since joining the school ahead of the 2009 season, it just seemed time for a change.

They won a national championship back in the 2011-12 season, but after three consecutive years not getting out of the first weekend of the tournament and not competing in the Elite Eight since the 2018-19 season, change seemed necessary for both sides.

#4: This gives a non-basketball powerhouse a huge boost

The Kentucky Wildcats are going to be fine as they established themselves as a basketball powerhouse. However, this gives Arkansas, who is not known as a men's college basketball contender, the ability to change their fortunes around.

Arkansas is not the outlier here as coaches who have a resume but are stagnant are going to be willing to move. We saw this with Andy Enfield leaving Southern California to SMU already but this is something beautiful for the potential options for coaches and players joining that new program.

#5: Kentucky is no longer a powerhouse

Kentucky basketball is going to be viewed as something completely different from what we got used to in the last 15+ years. People got comfortable with one-and-dones and now have to understand that Kentucky Wildcats men's basketball is going to be viewed differently.

This could all change if they can land a Rick Pitino or Dan Hurley in the head coaching position but as of right now, the Wildcats are not viewed as where they were last season. It's also important to remember that players may enter the NCAA Transfer Portal. This may happen after the news of Calipari leaving the program has come out.