Here is a letter from an avid Casual Hoya reader which may or may not be me.  And yes, I may or may not have just written a letter to myself.

Dear Casual Hoya Gang:

I am in a quandary.  I have an overwhelming hate towards the University of Kentucky Basketball team, and I don't know why.  I mean as a Georgetown fan, I really have no reason to foster such ill-will towards the Wildcats.  We are not in the same conference and have not played against them in over 25 years.   Nor have we really lost many recruits to them recently.  Where is all this hate stemming from and is it acceptable to hate Kentucky just because?

xoxo, 

Hire Esherick III

Dear HE III,

Thanks for writing.  It is always nice to hear from our readers, mainly because it confirms the fact that we have some.  To answer your question - yes, it is 100% acceptable to hate Kentucky Basketball just because.  You don't need a reason to hate something, there are plenty of things I despise for no reason, including but not limited to vacuums, snow globes and the guy from the UPS commercial.  But I have a feeling I know where your hate for Kentucky is stemming from.  Here are two reasons why it is acceptable to hate Kentucky.

(1) The Coach - The only coach ever to vacate two Final Four appearances with two different programs yet Wildcat fans are one step away from sainting John Calipari.  Whether or not he cheats is not for me to decide, but according to our friends at A Sea of Blue, the NCAA isn't capable of doing it correctly either, since they argue the NCAA was unable to adequately prove that Derrick Rose did not take the SAT.  I regress, the Derrick Rose scandal is old news and probably not the true reason you are hating Kentucky right now.  At the end of the day, everyone has strong opinions on the types of programs Calipari runs: you either think he is the greatest thing since sliced bread or a cheat exploiting the system.  But as a A Sea of Blue writer states when responding to the fact that the NCAA created a rule just to prevent Calipari (and possibly others) from entering into side arrangements with recruits outside the bounds of National Letters of Intent: "Let's be honest, loopholes exist to be exploited."  I guess we all owe a great deal of gratitude to John Calipari for combing through the rulebooks to find ways to avoid and exploit the regulations to which other programs abide.  What a model coach.  

(2) The Hype - Lights, smoke, podiums and teleprompters, Big Blue Midnight Madness had more gimmicks than if the State of the Union had been held on ice.  But did John Calipari really need two teleprompters to remind him to say that he was excited about being in Kentucky and that he will make fans happy?  Perhaps he needed the teleprompters to remind him which program he was now in charge of pumping and dumping.    And I get showing videos of the speech online, so fans that weren't able to make it can also be blessed by Saint Calipari.  But as Mike Miller of NBC points out, is it really necessary to translate the speech into seven foreign languages?  Is there really a huge demand for Kentucky basketball in Kazakhstan?  

It is important to point out, however, this hate is different from Duke hate, which stems from ESPN's nauseating love affair with the program and its long and storied tradition of floor slapping and flopping.  Kentucky hate stems from the love affair Wildcats have with themselves.  I want Kentucky to fail because I am sick of hearing about them. Immature, yes, but I never claimed to be mature, I mean after all, I may or may not have just written a letter to myself.

Good talk.