LEXINGTON (FIBA Americas Championship) - Kentucky coach John Calipari has revealed he plans on taking the reins of the Dominican Republic this summer at the FIBA Americas Championship in Argentina in an attempt to lead the Caribbean country into the London Olympics.

With nearby Puerto Rico making the surprise announcement late Tuesday night that Louisville coach Rick Pitino will not coach their national team, at least one prominent college coach looks set to be in Mar del Plata when that tournament is staged from August 30 to September 11.

Calipari, a former coach of the New Jersey Nets, has like Pitino had a lot of success in the college game.

He led Kentucky to within seconds of playing in the NCAA title game earlier this month before a narrow defeat to eventual champions Connecticut.

Calipari had previous stints with Massachusetts and Memphis.

He issued a statement on coachcal.com about his potential involvement with the Dominicans.

Calipari said: “During the season, I was approached by the Dominican Basketball Federation to become involved in helping grow basketball in their country. Now that our season is over, I can give proper attention to other things, such as this.

“My question to the Dominican Basketball Federation was, why are you calling me? Their response was, they liked what we are doing in China, including coaching their coaches and being involved in promoting grassroots basketball.

“Not only would I help train coaches in the Dominican Republic and here in Lexington like we have with the Chinese coaches, but I would also coach their national team.

“The commitment would mainly be from the start of August through mid-September. The Dominican Republic national team would train in our state-of-the-art facilities at the Joe Craft Center in Lexington prior to the start of the Tournament of the Americas, which would begin towards the end of August.”

Calipari, speaking to Kentucky fans, said: “I wanted the Big Blue Nation to be aware of what’s going on in your program. If I move forward on this, I’ll be asking you to adopt the Dominican Republic national team as your third team behind your Kentucky Wildcats and Team USA. I also want to let all our friends in China know that we will continue our relationship with the CBA and their coaches.”

In 2009, the Dominican Republic had high hopes of earning a trip to the FIBA World Championship with NBA players Al Horford (Atlanta Hawks), Francisco Garcia (Sacramento Kings) and Charlie Villanueva (Detroit Pistons) in the squad.

That Dominican side lost a crucial game to Canada and ended up fifth – one place out of the qualifying places.

FIBA