UK Coach John Calipari put the go in Go Big Blue when he ordered the team to move to a hotel outside of Newark.
“We wanted more privacy,” UK spokesman DeWayne Peevy wrote in an email. “We normally don’t stay at the same hotel with our band and cheerleaders.”
In addition to the band and cheerleaders, UK’s assigned hotel for the NCAA Tournament games in Newark also housed fans, UK president Lee Todd, Director of Athletics Mitch Barnhart and some members of school’s Board of Trustees.
Michael Percaccio, the general manager of the Wyndham Garden Hotel in Newark, said that Calipari made the decision.
“I guess he felt there was too much distraction” at the Wyndham, Percaccio said. “It’s an important game. He felt it would be better not to be here.”
UK plays No. 1 Ohio State in the Sweet 16 round on Friday.
Calipari moved the team to a hotel in Livingston, N.J., which is about 12 miles from Newark.
Jerry Tipton of the Lexington Herald- Leader has covered Kentucky basketball since the 1981-82 season. That time includes five coaches, five Final Fours, four athletic directors, two interim athletic directors and many memories. Before coming to Lexington, Tipton worked eight years for the Huntington (W.Va.) Herald-Dispatch. He covered Marshall’s basketball team for two seasons before coming to the Herald-Leader.
