Louisville HC Pat Kelsey 'Excited' About Year One Roster

The Cardinals flipped over their entire scholarship roster following the dismissal of previous head coach Kenny Payne.

New Louisville basketball head coach Pat Kelsey / Sam Upshaw Jr./Courier Journal / USA

LOUISVILLE, Ky. - To say that Pat Kelsey's first two months as the head coach of the Louisville men's basketball program have been hectic would be a massive understatement.

For starters, in the wake of the firing of previous head coach Kenny Payne, all 12 scholarship players from the 2023-24 roster proceeded to enter the transfer portal. The only returner from last season is walk-on guard Aidan McCool, who scored just two points in 17 minutes during the second and final year of the Payne era.

Even just 5-10 years ago, this would be an incredible rebuild for any coach to take on. Anyone walking into a situation such as this would need at least two to three years to put together a roster that is even remotely competitive.

Of course, in the era of the transfer portal, rosters change at a breakneck pace during the offseason. It's not completely uncommon to see almost entire teams flip on their head over the course of a few weeks. While pulling off a complete and total roster flip over the course of a single offseason is still incredibly difficult, it's within the realm of possibility in this day and age.

Between that, and ingratiating himself with one of the most college basketball crazy fanbases in the nation, Kelsey admittedly says the last two months since his hiring on Mar. 28 have been a "whirlwind."

"It seems like it's just been a nonstop, non-sleep time from the time that buzzer sounded," Kelsey said in a recent interview with Jon Rothstein on the College Hoops Today podcast. "In this new world of college basketball, no matter what — whether there's a transition when you change jobs and go from Charleston to Louisville, or you stay the head coach where you're at — it's a new dynamic where when the season ended, there was a little bit of a lull before transfer portal and things like that where, for the most part, most schools had the entirety of their roster already buttoned up.

"There was a time when you could step away a little bit and take a deep breath and get other things in order and dive back into it. But it really has changed to the point now where when the buzzer sounds, you really go into hyper-speed. You go into another level. It's just kind of the new normal. I'm used to it now, and I'm sure other coaches around the country are used to it, as well. It doesn't stop… Whether I changed jobs or not, I knew it was going to be a crazy spring."

Instead of making excuses for the hand he was dealt when accepting the job, Kelsey and his staff approached the challenge head-on. When the roster construction dust settled, Louisville wound up with a roster that - on paper - appears will be extremely competitive in year one.

12 of the 13 open scholarships wound up being filled by Division I transfers. According to On3's team transfer portal rankings, which takes into account transfers both in and out, Louisville has the No. 1 transfer portal class in all of college basketball.

Their No. 1 ranking is simply a byproduct of collecting a large amount of transfers, either. Nine of their transfer commits are regarded as four-star transfers, which is the most in college basketball, and four of them are top-100 transfers.

USF forward Kasean Pryor ranks as the No. 19 transfer, Colorado guard/forward J'Vonne Hadley comes in at No. 58, Wisconsin guard Chucky Hepburn is at No. 80 and Washington guard Koren Johnson place at No. 90.

Louisville also was able to snag a commitment from the high school ranks as well, bringing in top-35 forward Khani Rooths. When looking at the roster from a 30,000-foot view, Kelsey is "excited" about the group of players.

"The nice thing is you can obviously build a roster and do it quickly and put together a winning roster, and that's what I think we've done," Kelsey told Rothstein. "Our staff has done a phenomenal job, and they've worked very, very hard, and here we are as we get ready to enter the June summer school period where we have a majority of our roster in place and we feel really good about it. We're excited."

Since Kelsey was able to put together a competitive roster in such a short amount of time, Louisville is already starting to generate some buzz at the national level. In fact, the folks at 247Sports are already placing the Cardinals at No. 4 in their post-spring ACC Power Rankings.

While Payne did nothing but lament at how broken the program was, Kelsey has done the exact opponent from the moment he was formally introduced at his introductory press conference. Back then, he noted that his mindset at all times was "if you don't plan on winning, don't put your shoes on," and he echoed that very same sentiment to Rothstein - even doubling down on aspirations to win a championship.

"You don't put your shoes on, lace them up unless you're anticipating competing for a championship," he said. "That's it. I'm never going to go into a season like, 'Hey, this season will be a success if —.' I'm just not that way. I'm just a big believer, and I've been this way for my entire career, my entire head coaching career. We've won a ton of championships… We have a championship mentality every single day in how we recruit, how we coach, how we cultivate, how we build. And obviously that's the goal of every single season."

(Photo of Pat Kelsey: Sam Upshaw Jr./Courier Journal / USA)

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