FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Fireworks went off as new Arkansas men's basketball coach John Calipari was introduced to fans at Bud Walton Arena.
If his past success is an indicator, many more fireworks are forthcoming.
Arkansas hired Calipari on Wednesday, a day after the 65-year-old stepped down at Kentucky, the program he led to the 2012 national championship.
Calipari, who was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame as a coach in 2015, is the active wins leader in men's college basketball, with a career record of 855-263 in stops at Massachusetts (1988-96), Memphis (2000-09) and Kentucky, having led the Wildcats since 2009. The Pittsburgh-area native has directed his programs to six NCAA Final Fours and three national championship games. His numerous awards include AP men's basketball coach of the year in 2015.
At Arkansas, Calipari signed a five-year contract with an annual base salary of $7 million through April 2029 and a maximum of two automatic rollover years for NCAA tournament appearances that would extend the contract to 2031. The deal includes a $1 million signing bonus and features retention bonuses of $500,000 each year of the contract along with one-time bonuses for making the NCAA tourney, reaching the second round, the Sweet 16 and the Final Four and winning a national championship.
It's a slight drop as Kentucky had been paying Calipari $8.5 million annually.
At first glance, the Razorbacks' seismic move makes them immediate Southeastern Conference contenders. Calipari's Kentucky teams won six league tournament championships and six regular-season titles, though the Wildcats haven't won the SEC tourney since 2017.
Arkansas athletic director Hunter Yurachek said Calipari's reputation as an elite recruiter and his longtime success in the SEC were key draws.
"I talked to eight to 10 different coaches about this job," said Yurachek, who is also a vice chancellor for the school. "Here's what I want to be clear about: In spite of the reports, there was only one person that was offered this job."
Calipari replaces Eric Musselman, who after five seasons in Fayetteville left last week to take over at the University of Southern California. Calipari inherits a program that went 16-17 this past season, missing the NCAA tournament after three consecutive appearances in March Madness, including the Sweet 16 a year ago and the Elite Eight in 2021 and 2022.
While Kentucky, with eight NCAA titles, is considered one of the blue bloods of men's college basketball, the Razorbacks have made their own share of postseason noise. Arkansas has been to six Final Fours, won the national title in 1994 and lost in the NCAA final the year after that.
Excited Arkansas fans jammed the arena Wednesday, hoping to witness the start of a return to that level of greatness. John Tyson, the chairman of Tyson Foods, which is based in nearby Springdale, initially put Calipari and Yurachek in touch. Tyson got a standing ovation from the crowd when his presence was announced.
Later, the house lights flickered, then faded as a promo video that included Calipari's remarks at a news conference from a previous game against Arkansas played. Shortly thereafter, Calipari was introduced. He gave a fist pump on stage, hugged Yurachek and pointed to members of the crowd before pulling notes from his jacket and sitting down for an interview.
Calipari announced he was stepping down as Kentucky's coach on Tuesday, saying in a video that the Lexington program "needs to hear another voice."
He left the Wildcats after going 410-123 in 15 years, including 23-10 this past season. The past few campaigns have been disappointing by Kentucky standards with a 1-3 mark in its past three NCAA trips, including first-round losses to No. 14 seed Oakland last month and No. 15 seed Saint Peter's two years ago. The Wildcats were top-three seeds both times.
The most recent NCAA loss set off immediate calls to fire Calipari before athletic director Mitch Barnhart stated soon after that Calipari would return next season. Firing him would have triggered a buyout of more than $33 million to dismiss the coach under the terms of a "lifetime" contract — it was for 10 years — signed in 2019.
Calipari had no hard feelings about Kentucky.
"It was my dream job," Calipari said in the video. "Anybody in our profession looks at the University of Kentucky in basketball and said, 'That is the bluest of blue.' The last few weeks we've come to realize that this program probably needs to hear another voice, that the university as a whole has to have another voice giving guidance about this program that they hear and the fans need to hear."
Calipari knew he was heading to Arkansas before Tuesday's video was released.
"My thing to (Yurachek), probably at some point on Sunday was, 'Look, I feel really good. Just give me time. This is going to play,'" he said. "I think Monday night is when it was done. It was probably 11 o'clock at night or later. Tuesday morning, I did the video, and then my wife did a video, and we did this."
Before Calipari made his decision, he checked with University of Houston men's basketball coach Kelvin Sampson about Yurachek, a former athletic director for that school.
"I said, 'Tell me about Hunter,'" Calipari said. "Well, he almost jumped through the phone. ... He said, 'When you need things done, he goes and does it.'"