Fightin' Words: Kentucky vs. Louisville

By Joe Cox, Ryan Clark, Joe B. Hall and Denny Crum

The long-standing rivalry between the Kentucky Wildcats and the Louisville Cardinals is one of the most heated in college basketball. Facing off against each other on the court for over a century, the intrastate rivalry became red-hot over thirty years ago when the two faced each other in 1983 NCAA tournament, and Louisville narrowly edged out the Wildcats to advance to the Elite Eight. The heat hasn’t died down since ’83; in fact, the animosity between the two has only gotten stronger, with numerous face-offsboth on and off the court. In Fightin’ Words, Joe Cox and Ryan Clark expertly narrate the blow-by-blows of all the most important moments in the history of the Kentucky-Louisville rivalry.

Fightin’ Words, first published in 2014 and now newly updated in paperback, covers the hundred-plus year span of the feud. From the twelve games played prior to the fated 1983 meeting, to the Wildcat-Cardinal meet-up in the Final Four round of 2014 NCAA tournament, and every game in between through the 2014-15 season, all the games covered include insightful pregame evaluation, commentary on the games’ most important plays, and expert postgame analysis, along with interviews from key players. From off the court, read how Louisville coach Denny Crum craftily out-recruited Kentucky coach Joe Hall or the athletes in inner-city Louisville; discover a blow-by-blow of Hall of Fame coach Rick Pitino’s move from the Wildcats to the Cardinals; and learn how John Calipari transformed a losing Kentucky team into NCAA Champions. With individual chapters chronicling every meet-up, Fightin’ Words is a must-have for every true fan of college basketball.

Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Sports Publishing imprint, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in sportsbooks about baseball, pro football, college football, pro and college basketball, hockey, or soccer, we have a book about your sport or your team.

Whether you are a New York Yankees fan or hail from Red Sox nation; whether you are a die-hard Green Bay Packers or Dallas Cowboys fan; whether you root for the Kentucky Wildcats, Louisville Cardinals, UCLA Bruins, or Kansas Jayhawks; whether you route for the Boston Bruins, Toronto Maple Leafs, Montreal Canadiens, or Los Angeles Kings; we have a book for you. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to publishing books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked by other publishers and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sports Publishing
• Release date: Oct 11, 2016
• ISBN: 9781613219263

Joe Cox

Joe Cox has been a lifelong student of management. He started up the corporate ladder as a dishwasher for a restaurant chain in Denver in the 1960’s. After several years as a high school biology teacher, he entered the corporate world again and reached one goal in 1990 when he became President and CEO of a manufacturing company. After that, Cox went on his own as a business consultant. His clients included Pepsi Cola, Nabisco, Lockheed Martin, Hughes Supply, Cementos Progreso, the States of Kansas and Arizona, US West Communications, Frito Lay, UniFirst Corporation and many more large and small businesses over more than two decades. He currently consults for Zoetis, formerly Pfizer Animal Health. Cox attended the University of Colorado, Evangel University, University of South Africa, Damelin College and the University of Durban, Westville. Wherever he worked or studied, he had one thing on his mind - improving businesses’ performance. He waded through the research from the last 90 years and stayed abreast of new studies as they were published. He conducted numerous scientific studies of his own, testing his ideas and the conclusions of scholars in the management field. Cox also launched and operated several businesses in farming, construction and business consulting. To implement proven results, he developed a comprehensive set of principles and tools that train managers and make them accountable for profit at every organizational level through performance metrics. Nail it Today encapsulates not just the Author’s research, practice, experimentation and tools but the proven conclusions of every scholar and investigator who added to our understanding of management since the early 1900’s. The Author ties all concrete results together into an airtight case for growing profit by putting people first. Some sections of Cox’s and Zelaya’s 2007 book, What I Didn’t Learn in My MBA – The Third Dimension of Profit are included in support of the strategies offered. Joe Cox lives with his wife, business consultant Dr. Regina Rodriguez Cox, in Weston, Florida.