{"id":711946,"date":"2026-04-16T19:51:39","date_gmt":"2026-04-16T19:51:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/711946\/"},"modified":"2026-04-16T19:51:39","modified_gmt":"2026-04-16T19:51:39","slug":"could-kentucky-basketball-play-a-foreign-tour-every-summer-now-new-rule-opens-up-possibility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/711946\/","title":{"rendered":"Could Kentucky Basketball play a foreign tour every summer now? New rule opens up possibility"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">We will likely see the <a href=\"https:\/\/ukathletics.com\/sports\/mbball\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Kentucky Basketball<\/a> team play on a foreign tour this summer, but what if that became a yearly occurrence?<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">A new rule approved by the NCAA opens up that possibility.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">The NCAA Division I Cabinet announced a new rule change this week that would allow men\u2019s and women\u2019s basketball to participate in a foreign tour every year. That\u2019s a significant change from the previous rule, which only permitted these foreign tours every four years.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Under the previous rule, the Kentucky men\u2019s basketball team wouldn\u2019t have been eligible for another foreign tour until this coming summer.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Now, Mark Pope and Kenny Brooks will have the opportunity to possibly take their squads on an international trip every summer.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Will that happen? Nothing has been set in stone just yet, but if you recall, Mark Pope mentioned the idea back in February, noting the possibility of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aseaofblue.com\/kentucky-wildcats-basketball\/164203\/foreign-summer-tour-2026-uk-trip\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">\u201can epic summer tour.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Pope publicly praised the idea then, emphasizing how these trips help teams bond over the summer.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Where could the team end up playing? Pope didn\u2019t specify, but noted that it would be somewhere the team had never been before. If I\u2019m guessing, some kind of European tour would make sense, but Italy would likely be off the list, as Kentucky went there before the 95-96 season when Pope was a player at Kentucky. Spain, Greece, and France are some countries other teams have played in over recent years.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Regardless, I think we should expect Kentucky to play in one of these foreign tours this summer, and with what is expected to be multiple new additions to the roster for next season, a foreign tour could be very valuable to help the team bond heading into the most consequential season of Mark Pope\u2019s coaching career.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We will likely see the Kentucky Basketball team play on a foreign tour this summer, but what if&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":711947,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3723],"tags":[7,217,38124,10038,244,8582,231,772,1544],"class_list":{"0":"post-711946","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-college-basketball","10":"tag-kentucky-wildcats-basketball-news","11":"tag-kentucky-womens-basketball","12":"tag-kentucky-wildcats-basketball","13":"tag-kentucky-wildcats-news","14":"tag-ncaa","15":"tag-ncaa-basketball","16":"tag-ncaab"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116416135209022301","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=711946"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711946\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/711947"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=711946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=711946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=711946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}