Just minutes into John Calipari’s introductory news conference he touched on the important issue of the hour.

Will he be the ambassador so many long to see in the UK coaching chair? If you hadn’t heard, UK’s last coach had a little problem with that.

“We will be involved in this community,” Calipari said of his family. “We want to be involved.”

Frequently during the 53-minute news conference, Calipari made reference to former UK players and coaches.

He said he’d spoken to Rex Chapman, Nazr Mohammed and Tayshaun Prince. He placed a call for Dan Issel. He asked advice from Joe B. Hall, Eddie Sutton, Rick Pitino and Tubby Smith. He even requested that the wife and daughter of Bill Keightley be present at the news conference.

His predecessor was all-too frequently criticized for not including former UK dignitaries in his program. He just didn’t get what it meant to be part of the Big Blue Family, his critics would say.

So far John Calipari gets it.

“I know how big this program is,” Calipari said. “But it’s only big because of the players that have gone through here.”

Calipari spoke of academics and graduation rates. He said that when he took over at the University of Massachusetts the graduation rate was 15 percent; when he left it was 80 percent. He said when he took the Memphis job their graduation rate was 0 percent and when he left 19 of 22 seniors had graduated.

Memphis’s Academic Progress Rate was .927 in the 2008 report released by the NCAA. That placed his program in the 40th to 50th percentile among men’s basketball teams. UK’s APR during that same time was .941, good enough for the 50th to 60th percentile.

While some skeptics voiced concerns over Memphis’s APR of .927, just two points above the proverbial danger zone, Calipari spoke of the importance he would place on academics.

“If they don’t want to go to class and don’t want to do the tutorials, when I get back we’ll figure out where they need to go,” Calipari said of the current UK roster.

During the final days of the Billy Gillispie era news began to circulate about the student athlete’s poor experience under the former coach. Athletic Director Mitch Barnhart spoke of the importance of that experience at the news conference announcing Gillispie’s firing.

Junior guard Jodie Meeks told the Kernel that he thought the decision to let Gillispie go was a good one.

All this just confirmed what anyone who watched UK had long expected. These players weren’t having much fun.

“Last year we didn’t really have a fun style of play,” freshman guard Landon Slone said. “But watching Memphis, he did some great things there. That’s about as exciting as it gets.”

“My job will be helping them reach their dreams,” Calipari said. “We want the players to have fun.”

Calipari spoke of the family atmosphere he hoped to create with the UK program. He said he hoped the players he left behind at Memphis would understand that they each had dreams they wanted to accomplish and coaching at UK was his dream.

He said because they were a family they would understand that.

He made a point to say goodbye to each of his players at Memphis individually before they heard the news from someone else. He even returned to Memphis Tuesday for a second news conference to say goodbye.

We all know the UK coaching position is about winning games. It’s about recruiting the best players to play for the NCAA’s all-time wins leader. Calipari’s record speaks for itself in those areas.

The question going into Tuesday’s news conference was how he stacked up in the public aspects of the job.

“He’s got the courage, and he’s not afraid of it,” Barnhart said.

Calpari can go a long way to cementing his positive image in the Bluegrass with more glowing appearances like Tuesday.

“I enjoy really letting people know about the city I work in and the university I work for,” Calipari said. “There will be no bigger cheerleader for this place than me.”

If Tuesday was Calipari’s first test at being UK’s foremost ambassador, he passed with flying colors.