Calipari Signs New Contract with UK

University of Kentucky men's basketball coach John Calipari, who led the Wildcats to the school's 16th NCAA Final Four appearance last season, has been rewarded with a new seven-year contract, UK Director of Athletics Mitch Barnhart announced Thursday. See attachments for the actual contract, which includes an amendment to the previous agreement along with details of the seven-year deal.

Basketball has long been the marquee sport at the University of Kentucky," Barnhart said. "It's a sport that the traditions of this university and this state have been founded on. They were developed and sort of started from the get-go by Adolph Rupp and through many good people since. What Cal has done is returned us to those glory days of Final Fours and championship efforts, great players, and all along he's helped young people understand the responsibility of going to class, of the commitment to each other and to a program that has as rich of a tradition as this one does. It has long been our goal over the last three to five years that Cal enjoy this as his final stop in coaching and that he has an opportunity to finish his career at the University of Kentucky and hopefully set standards and win championships that will be remembered for many, many years to come."