The Lexington Herald-Leader’s Scott Sloan reports the University of Kentucky’s basketball media relations department has banned (temporarily) the school’s paper from a preseason Q &A with players over having the temerity to actually pursue a story.
The dispute began when Kernel sportswriter and managing editor Aaron Smith found the phone numbers in UK’s student directory for walk-ons Brian Long and Sam Malone after seeing them named in a post on Kentuckysportsradio.com and mentioned in a Twitter post by UK freshman basketball player Anthony Davis. UK basketball coach John Calipari has since posted on Twitter that the two are indeed walk-ons.
“He only asked the question, ‘Are you a walk-on on the basketball team?'” Kernel editor in chief Taylor Moak said. “They said yes. He said, ‘Would you be willing to talk now or later today?,’ and they said no.”
UK’s associate athletics director for media relations Dewayne Peevy told the Herald-Leader on Monday night that Smith’s second question overstepped the boundaries of the “understanding between the media members and the University of Kentucky,” which allows student-athletes to be students and not “be bombarded with interview requests constantly.”
Peevy rescinded Smith’s invitation to an event in which he and other members of select media outlets would meet all of the basketball players and have eight minutes of time alone with each of them. Information from the interviews is not to be published until Oct. 1. Peevy said it’s an opportunity given only to select media “to test some of my guys out.”
Earlier this year on Twitter, Peevy appeared to suggest that CBSSports.com’s Gary Parrish would not receive a UK basketball credential this year after publishing a column on questions previously raised about Davis’ recruitment to UK.