If you haven’t heard the buzz, the bugs are back in town.
Cicada Brood XIV (aka the Bourbon Brood) is emerging from its 17-year cyclical subterranean slumber. We haven’t seen these visitors since they last descended on Lexington in 2008 — so let’s catch them up on what’s happened here since then:
Keeping up with the Cats
- No, Billy Gillespie isn’t still coaching the Cats. He left UK in 2009 and we’ve actually had two new head basketball coaches since then, including John Calipari, who led us to the NCAA title back in 2012, and Mark Pope, who joined UK in 2024. (Speaking of popes, we’ve also had two of those since you were here last.)
Great Drought of ’08
- Yes, it did eventually rain here since you last visited us in the Great Drought of 2008. In fact, we’ve had more than 800 inches of precipitation in Kentucky since then — and so much rain lately we’d almost forgotten how dry that year was until you just brought it up.
CenterPointe City Center construction
- Oh, you’re wondering what happened to that block of downtown rubble that was set to be the new site for our $250 million, 40-story CenterPointe project? Well, we didn’t make the ambitious deadline to have it open by the time we hosted the FEI World Equestrian Games back in 2010. The design, scale, name — and pretty much every detail of the project — evolved greatly since you were here. But yes, we did get ‘er done.
What did we miss? Fill in the Bourbon Brood, we’ll make sure to pass it along.
