UK basketball great Jack 'Goose' Givens talks about his new book and the start of the Mark Pope era

Chet White

Jack (Goose) Givens is among the most popular athletes ever to wear Kentucky’s blue and white. He led the Wildcats to the 1978 NCAA basketball championship, scoring 41 points against Duke in the final game. He earned All-American and multiple All-SEC honors while at UK. He is third on the all-time scoring list for UK men’s basketball with 2,038 points, behind only Dan Issel and Kenny Walker. Givens went on to play professionally in the NBA, and in Italy, Belgium and Japan. He has had a long and successful broadcasting career in college and professional basketball, and just completed his second season as the analyst for UK radio broadcasts, teaming with play-by-play announcer Tom Leach. Givens recently released a book about his life, They Call Me Goose, co-written with Doug Brunk.