​LEXINGTON — Kentucky basketball is still trying to reclaim its place among the sport’s giants.Yes, the Wildcats remain the winningest program in college hoops history. But UK hasn’t reached the Final Four since 2015. It’s the school’s longest drought since a 13-year stretch from 1998 (with Tubby Smith) to 2011 (with John Calipari).Kentucky hasn’t even advanced to the Elite Eight since 2019. Since the NCAA Tournament expanded to 16 teams in 1951 — that required every qualifying school to win a game to move on to the final eight — the current dry spell of seven years is another program worst.SEC success, once a birthright for the Wildcats, has been harder to come by as well.UK has 49 regular-season championships; it has none since 2019-20.Kentucky also claims 31 SEC Tournament crowns; it hasn’t won the event since 2018.Upon his hire, Mark Pope promised to bring all those trophies back to Lexington — capped by a ninth national championship. Pope has yet to deliver on any of those fronts entering Year 3.That’s why, in all likelihood, this season is a referundum on his tenure.Here are three questions Pope and the Wildcats must answer during the 2026-27 campaign to earn their 18th Final Four appearance:Can Kentucky get back to shooting 3s the way it did in Mark Pope’s first season?In Pope’s first season, no conference club was more accurate beyond the arc. The Cats knocked down 37.5% of their 3-point attempts in 2024-25. Last season was a different story. UK ranked outside the top half of the league in that category, making only 34.2% of its triples. Additionally, that was outside the top 150 nationally.On paper, this season’s team is built more similarly to Pope’s first group.That bunch brought in a transfer (Koby Brea) who led the country in 3-point percentage the season before; this bunch brought in a transfer (Milan Momcilovic) who led the country in 3-point percentage the season before.Beyond Brea, however, the 2024-25 Wildcats had five other players sink at least 35% of their shots from distance. Last season, only three Cats eclipsed that percentage.Momcilovic is all but guaranteed to reach that figure.The question is, how many teammates will join him?How well Kentucky answers that will go a long way toward determining its ceiling, as Pope’s best teams have always been masterpieces offensively.Can the Wildcats overcome a lack of brute strength?Pope hasn’t avoided the subject.Multiple times during the offseason, he has acknowledged what he views as UK’s primary weakness heading into the season.”Everybody’s gotten so big and so physical, and that’s not us right now,” Pope said during an interview with Field of 68’s Jeff Goodman that posted Aug. 10. “We are long and fast and skilled, which (are) the teams that I love to coach; we have one of those teams. I’ve been blessed, especially on the offensive side of the ball, where you just get 15 minutes into the game, and you have coaches on the other end throwing clipboards in the air because