Mark Pope explains what makes Bruce Pearl, Johni Broome exhilarating ahead of Kentucky vs Auburn

The Kentucky Wildcats, coached by Mark Pope, are ramping up for their first postseason under a new system and tutelage. As the 17th-ranked team in the nation, they won a nail-biting affair against the unranked Oklahoma Sooners, 83-82, on the road on Wednesday. It was their eight conference win of the 2024-25 season, 19th overall.

Pope and Co. will bank on the momentum gained from the SEC victory toward their next matchup, which is against the first-ranked squad in the country, the Bruce Pearl-coached Auburn Tigers, on their home floor on Saturday.

During the pre-game presser for the hotly contested fixture earlier on Friday,, Pope explained why such a matchup against the program that has stayed atop of the college basketball landscape throughout the year is exhilarating to him.

"I think the beautiful part of longevity is we don't have it in college athletics very much anymore. You just get to know each other so well, and you start to get to build things around it. If, for example, I was starting with this team today with the whole season ahead of us, one they already have this foundational knowledge of how we approach the game," he said. (2:20)

"But, two, I actually know situations I'm learning every day, fun situations that we can put our guys in where it's like, 'Hey, this player just has a unique knack to kind of make this play more often than not.' And so, clearly, they know each other really really well and the more foundation you have, the more creative you get to be," Pope added.

"The more comfortable you get to be, the more you get to explore the game, which is what makes it really exhilarating," he concluded.

Following the much-anticipated game against the Johni Broome-led Tigers, Pope and the rest of the Wildcats will have two regular-season fixtures left, starting with the unranked LSU Tigers on Tuesday at home and against the No. 14-ranked Missouri Tigers on March 8 away.

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The Auburn Tigers haven't won against the Kentucky Wildcats in away territory since 1988

Despite being hailed as the top-ranked team in the nation for most of the season, the Auburn Tigers are yet to win in the Kentucky Wildcats' home arena, the Rupp Arena, for more than 35 years.

The last time the program won against their SEC opponent on the road was in January 1988, as Mark Pope and Co. look to defend that home winning streak on Saturday.

Should Auburn pull off the triumph against the team they haven't beaten away for more than three decades, they will have the No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA tournament as well as the SEC regular season championship.