On a day when the 2020 NCAA Tournament was canceled due to concerns about the rapid spread of the coronavirus, John Calipari appeared on ESPN's SportsCenter to discuss his reaction.

The Kentucky coach said it was a devastating and emotional day for all involved in the process but "nobody's fault."

"It had to be done," said Calipari, whose Wildcats were preparing to face the Alabama-Tennessee winner on Friday afternoon in the SEC Tournament at Nashville's Bridgestone Arena. The Crimson Tide and Volunteers never played, however, as the SEC joined the wave of conferences that opted to cancel their events.

"But forget about all that," Calipari added. "How 'bout kids? I talk about my team, and I had to tell them, I'm really going to miss this team. I think we could have won the national title. I think we had a bunch of guys who really liked each other. We didn't have one bad practice all year. Not one. The last team that had done that for me won the national title or was in the final game.

"Fate intervened but they deserved to keep playing."

The UK boss said he hoped that Big Blue Nation appreciated the 2019-20 team as much as he did. The Cats finished 25-6, No. 8 in the country, and won the 49th SEC championship in school history.

"I hope the fans take on this team," he said. "If we had been in the Final Four and won the national title, this may have been the most favorite team I have coached here in 11 years. But they didn't get a chance to be that team... They don't have a chance to live that last moment, whether you're going to win or lose, which will be with them the rest of their life. That's, for me, the hard thing to swallow."

Calipari noted it's a tough lesson that young people have to learn about the real world: "It's not fair... You also learn fate intervenes sometimes in your life, some of it good -- in our lives, many, many things have been good -- some of it bad. Some of it's man-made, some self-made, some of it not. Now, it's how do you deal with that?"

Kentucky could have "four or five" players enter their names in the NBA Draft, Calipari said, but he was quick to point out that the process will be much different than it has been in the past.

"When is the draft? What is the draft? What is the combine? When is the combine?" Calipari asked. "Are they going to have people, players fly in with their families and agents to work them out? Well, they're not coming to our campus because we're not letting you. Will there even be a draft?"

Calipari said the Cats will resume training in Lexington, but "you may not know where the end of the road is. You're running down a dark hallway and hope a doorway's not open. This is a hard thing for these kids."