‘He brings a calmness.’ New assistant brings grit, poise to UK basketball coaching staff.

The offseason of change in the Kentucky men’s basketball program wasn’t limited to the players on the court.

Yes, the Wildcats’ roster is now absent of program legend Oscar Tshiebwe and features eight freshman players and nine newcomers in total. But the coaching staff around head coach John Calipari also looks different.

Former assistant coach K.T. Turner is now the head coach at Texas-Arlington, and the Wildcats welcomed two new assistant coaches into the fold this offseason: Chuck Martin and John Welch.

Welch, a longtime NBA assistant coach, is heavily involved with UK’s on-court player development program and with the team’s offensive strategies.

But Martin, who joined the UK coaching staff in July, brings a distinct set of skills to his new post on the Kentucky bench: A coach with more than two decades of college basketball experience, Martin has reunited with Calipari after also being part of his coaching staff at Memphis.

Along with Orlando Antigua and Chin Coleman, Martin is one of three UK assistant coaches who, along with Calipari, jet around the country in pursuit of top basketball talent.

The 54-year-old Martin (who was born in Puerto Rico and grew up in New York City) has also been an assistant coach at Indiana, South Carolina and Oregon, along with a head coaching stint at Marist.

But before any of this, Martin was a school teacher.

For seven years he taught global studies and business math (teaching things like how to balance a checkbook) before briefly running a basketball camp and then joining the college coaching world at age 29.

“I thought I was going to be a school teacher for the rest of my life,” Martin told the Herald-Leader during an interview at the Joe Craft Center, UK’s on-campus basketball practice facility.

“... My title is assistant coach, I think director of recruiting, but really I’m a teacher at heart.”

Martin is listed as the primary recruiter, per 247Sports, for players like Kwame Evans Jr. (an Oregon freshman and projected lottery pick in the 2024 NBA Draft), former Indiana players Thomas Bryant and OG Anunoby (both NBA Draft picks) and former South Carolina guard A.J. Lawson, who is also in the NBA.

The new recruiting quartet of Antigua, Calipari, Coleman and Martin has already made a splash by securing the commitment of five-star class of 2024 guard Boogie Fland.

But in talking to people in and around the UK program, it’s clear Martin brings far more than just a strong recruiting acumen to Lexington.

“He’s been in our profession in different places. He’s really upbeat, really positive,” Calipari said of Martin during UK’s media day in October.

“He is a worker, a grinder, has great relationships with the players and has great ties in recruiting.”

UK players appreciate daily mindset from Martin

In addition to the obvious value Martin brings to Kentucky from a recruiting perspective, he also offers a fresh set of eyes to help further develop a UK squad filled with newcomers.

At UK’s media day last month, players young and old discussed what Martin brings to the gym on a daily basis.

“One thing is he’s just a great guy. He really knows what he’s talking about,” freshman guard Reed Sheppard said. “He’s always giving positive information, always building you up. And then when he needs to, he’ll come in and he’ll talk to you about things you need to work on.”

“What he brings is little details that we need on the floor,” said fifth-year guard Antonio Reeves, who credited Martin with helping him with defensive positioning. “... Just pinpoint things that we don’t know as players that we need to focus on when we’re out there.”

“He’s always pointing stuff out to me, helping me out through possessions and stuff like that,” added second-year player Adou Thiero. “He’ll probably see moments where I could have scored the ball and tell me I should have went up with the ball there. Just letting me know that I’ve got to be more aggressive when I get in the paint.”

When it comes to the way Martin approaches his daily interactions with everyone from UK players to program staffers, he draws upon his past life as a school teacher.

“That’s how I started out. ... I had 30 kids in a classroom. I had to organize the 30 kids. I had to lesson plan. I had to teach something. There was a quiz at the end of the week,” Martin said. “There’s tons of parallels between teaching in a classroom and teaching at the collegiate level on a team. ... The film room and on the court become my classroom.”

What does Martin look to teach the Wildcats? And how does he try to go about communicating what he notices?

“If practice is going up and down and I see something, I’m careful. I pick my spots,” Martin said. “When there’s a 30-second break in the action and I’m standing next to Antonio or Reed or Robert (Dillingham) or Tre (Mitchell) or anybody, I just kind of pull them aside and say, ‘Hey, you should be more on help side.’ Or, if we’re running an action, ‘Here’s your first read, here’s your second read, but this could be your third read. It’s a progression.’”

“If you have a blind spot, I can support that by saying, ‘Hey, you didn’t see this at that particular moment.’”

Martin’s move to Lexington brings him closer to family

Family was a driving factor behind Martin’s decision, and ability, to link up again with Calipari.

Martin and his wife, Lee, have three children: Daughter Ashley-Monet (who played college basketball at Iona) is grown up and lives in New York City, and son Jordan plays college basketball at North Carolina A&T.

That leaves Martin’s youngest son, Justin, who is a freshman just a few months into his college experience at UK.

“It was a neat thing that (Justin) was already here and that the opportunity presented itself for me to kind of reconnect with him a little bit,” Martin said. “I respect (Justin’s) space. I let him do his thing and it’s worked out so far. It’s been good.”

When it comes to basketball matters, Calipari has recently (and frequently) teased the prospect of future recruiting success for the Wildcats.

Calipari’s already oft-repeated line centers around Kentucky’s 2024 recruiting class — currently comprised of Fland and center Somto Cyril — being good, while UK’s 2025 class (still without a commitment) will perhaps be even better.

Martin figures to play a major part in this vision becoming reality: “As recruiting coordinator, (Martin) will independently manage official and unofficial visits and be responsible for all recruiting strategy for the program,” reads a line from Martin’s official UK online bio page.

“I think the biggest thing for me is sitting down with Coach (Cal) and ... getting clarity on, ‘Hey, this kid will work. This is a good match here at Kentucky. This is a good match, a good fit, for Coach Cal,’” Martin said of his recruiting efforts at UK.

“I think once we identify that, then obviously talent and size and IQ and can we get him?”

Martin’s contract at UK runs from July 1, 2023, until June 30, 2025, which means he’s under contract at the school for both the 2023-24 and 2024-25 seasons.

He will be paid $350,000 this season, and would be paid $375,000 next season.

Martin brings sense of calm to UK coaches, players

Martin enjoys plenty of long-term connections with his new co-workers in Lexington.

There was the aforementioned time spent with Calipari at Memphis, which included the 2007-08 season in which the Tigers reached the NCAA championship game.

“You can feel free to teach and coach,” Martin said of the way Calipari empowers his coaching staff and players. “There’s a level of comfort (with Calipari), which has allowed me to transition to Kentucky, a little bit easier I guess.”

UK associate to the head coach Bruiser Flint had Martin as part of his coaching staffs when Flint was the head coach at Massachusetts and Drexel.

Antigua was born in the Dominican Republic, but like Martin also grew up in The Bronx in New York City.

Both men overlapped for two years at St. Raymond High School for Boys, and both are members of the school’s hall of fame.

“(He’s) another guy I can speak Spanish to,” Antigua said at a recent press conference about Martin’s arrival at UK. “Chuck’s got great experience, great poise. He’s coached at so many different levels. ... He brings a calmness to the kids and the staff.”

Martin acknowledges that he and Antigua will share a stray comment or two in Spanish over the course of a work day, whether on the practice court or in the office.

But beyond this decades-long relationship with Antigua, Martin often draws upon the values instilled in him from his Bronx upbringing.

Martin grew up in the Highbridge neighborhood in the South Bronx, and remembers taking the subway alone to school as a 13-year-old.

Those trips built the approach he carries with him in Lexington.

“It’s a tough place, so you create a grit about you. A sense of urgency about you,” Martin said of his childhood. “Nothing was given: You wake up and you jump on the subway, you don’t have a designated seat. You’ve got to fight for that seat.”

“And nothing’s changed, you’re trying to fight for victories. You’re trying to fight for national championships. You’re trying to fight for SEC championships. So that mindset and that grit that was created back in 1975 still exists today. There’s a work ethic. There’s a toughness that comes from that environment that has really, really helped me throughout my career.”