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Mark Pope made it clear he’d be keeping the state’s top talent home in Kentucky when he took the job, stressing the importance of players understanding what it means to be a Wildcat and wear the blue and white. No one understands the magnitude of that more than kids who grow up here as members of Big Blue Nation, the ones bleeding blue from the day they were born. It’s those who counted down the shot clock as Rex or Richie or Delk or Walker or Wall or Knight or Booker or Ulis or Monk in the backyard looking to hit the game-winner before doing it themselves inside Rupp Arena like Reed Sheppard …

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