Kentucky
Kentucky basketball should sit Jayden Quaintance for entire season so he can get healthy
Kentucky basketball coach Mark Pope on new UK transfers, freshmen
From incoming freshmen to seasoned players from the portal, UK basketball coach Mark Pope breaks down each new player on his 2025 squad.
BIRMINGHAM, AL — At his best, Kentucky basketball forward Jayden Quaintance has the makings of a dominant force and a future pro career.
The operative phrase being at his best.
Quaintance is far from that now. Most players who had surgery to repair a torn anterior cruciate ligament in their right knee in March would not be back to full health now, either.
UK coach Mark Pope should consider what Quaintance is not and hold him out for the entire season.
“He feels like he’s on the verge of being ready to go, and we’re just hitting the brakes full time right now to make sure, because his future is going to be incredibly bright in this game,” Pope said Tuesday at SEC Tipoff media days.
Quaintance had his surgery five days before USC star JuJu Watkins suffered her own ACL injury in a game. Watkins, who is projected to be the next big star in the women’s game, announced last month that she was going to sit out the entire season.
The timing of Quaintance’s injury and surgery is what makes his status so precarious.
Modern medicine has made it so ACL injuries stopped being career-enders a long time ago. And there have been many successful examples of players with ACL injuries who returned and were productive the next season. But those examples tend to be players who weren’t injured in the same calendar year.
“I’m not sure exactly how long the wait is,” Pope said. “I don’t think there’s a chance we could keep him from playing this season. I think he’s too excited, too talented, worked too hard to get back. He’s going to be really special.”
Here’s the thing: UK doesn’t need Quaintance to have a special season and pursue the ninth national title that has been so ingrained in its roster. He’s just a piece of the puzzle with a full supporting cast.
Junior Brandon Garrison has had a promising offseason and looks to take on a larger role than last season. Pope called Malachi Moreno an “impactful freshman” who was “unbelievable on the glass” and shooting 80% from the field in practice scrimmages.
“I didn’t know that’s the guy I recruited a year ago,” Pope said.
Sophomore Andrija Jelavić, despite arriving on campus in August, can also help the Cats fill out their frontcourt in place of Quaintance.
Even if Quaintance is cleared for full contact and able to play during the Cats’ nonconference portion of their schedule, he’s probably not going to be at his best.
The more likely scenario is that Quaintance plays the will he or won’t he be available type of guessing game that summarized Shaedon Sharpe’s career at UK.
Sitting Quaintance out might risk him never suiting up for the Wildcats. He could follow the Sharpe route and choose to enter next year’s NBA draft.
That’s OK.
His knee would be closer to full strength, and he could comport himself accordingly on the court. Quaintance can’t do that now, no matter how good he looks dunking the ball, when unchallenged, or going through non-contact drills.
Most players who have suffered ACL injuries have told me in the past that it took an entire year just to feel normal and their second season back from the injury was when they were physically able to perform in the way that they used to do.
Quaintance is apparently clearing hurdles to get back ahead of schedule.
“He is racing back to health at light speed right now,” Pope said. “It is remarkable what he’s doing; we’re all kind of shaking our heads and feeling like how is this humanly possible?”
Better to marvel at his recovery while anticipating him playing next season than to end up shaking our collective heads in hindsight saying he rushed back too soon.
Sit him out this season.
Reach sports columnist C.L. Brown at clbrown1@gannett.com, follow him on X at @CLBrownHoops and subscribe to his newsletter at profile.courier-journal.com/newsletters/cl-browns-latest to make sure you never miss one of his columns.
Entering the weekend, Vanderbilt baseball had gotten swept in its only SEC series in which it hadn’t won the first game.
So the Commodores had a tough task in a series they badly needed after dropping the opener 5-2 on a walk-off grand slam after Vanderbilt’s best healthy starter, Connor Fennell, pitched well.
But the Commodores (24-17, 9-9 SEC) rebounded to take the series with an 8-7 win in the second game and a 13-6 win in the finale April 19. They did that despite not having any pitcher go more than three innings in either game. Though the pitching was still shaky at times — they issued more free passes than strikeouts in both of the wins — they worked out of enough jams to let the offense go to work.
Here’s what we learned from the series.
Will Hampton proves an unlikely hero for the offense
Vanderbilt got strong performances from a few of its typical top performers, including Braden Holcomb (6-for-13, four doubles) and Brodie Johnston (4-for-12, two home runs, three walks). But one of the biggest hits of the series came from the unlikeliest of sources.
Logan Johnstone was held out of the finale after colliding with Mike Mancini in Game 2, and in his place coach Tim Corbin opted to go with redshirt freshman Will Hampton in left field. Hampton had recorded just six college plate appearances, all of which were in nonconference games.
But Hampton reached in all three of his plate appearances against Kentucky, first on a single, then a walk. In the sixth inning, with the score tied, he came up with the bases loaded and two outs and blasted a grand slam, giving Vanderbilt its first lead.
Tyler Baird learns the ups and downs of being a closer
Freshman Tyler Baird has been Vanderbilt’s closer for the past three weeks, recording his first save April 2 against Texas A&M. But he learned the pitfalls that can come with that role in Game 1 against Kentucky. Summoned for an eight-out save with the Commodores leading 2-1, he retired the first five batters, but loaded the bases with nobody out in the ninth. He struck out the next two batters but then gave up the walk-off grand slam.
Baird returned for Game 3, this time attempting a five-out save and coming in with runners on first and second and one out with a three-run lead in the eighth inning. He allowed both inherited runners to score, but kept the lead and then had a scoreless ninth inning after Vanderbilt scored three runs in the top of the inning.
Baird’s emergence has been key for the Commodores, and the Game 3 bounce-back was especially important.
Vanderbilt’s RPI shows improvement
On April 15, Vanderbilt was 95th in RPI, a mark that wasn’t going to cut it for NCAA Tournament selection. But with a road series win against a Kentucky team that started the week in the top 20 of RPI, the Commodores moved all the way up to 75th, according to Warren Nolan.
While Vanderbilt will need to keep moving up — a top-50 mark would be ideal — the series win did a lot. In the next two weeks, it will face two top-five RPI teams in Alabama and Texas, giving more opportunity to improve its standing.
Aria Gerson covers Vanderbilt athletics for The Tennessean. Contact her at agerson@gannett.com or on X @aria_gerson.
Power forward has been one of the positions that Mark Pope and the Kentucky Wildcats have to fill with Andrija Jelavic and Mo Dioubate gone. The two players that Pope has had on campus at the power forward position are Syracuse’s Donnie Freeman and Colorado’s Sebastian Rancik. Both are really good players, but Freeman is better by a wide margin.
It has felt that entire time that Kentucky wanted Rancik as the backup to Freeman or a backup plan if they weren’t able to land Freeman. Well, Rancik just picked Florida State, so perhaps this is a sign that the Wildcats will land Freeman.
Big Blue Nation was torn on Rancik, but I do believe he would have been a really solid backup power forward. I personally didn’t want him to be the starting four for this team. It is clear that he wanted to go somewhere where he could be the guy at the four, so he will be heading to the ACC to play for FSU.
Now that Kentucky has missed on Rancik, it is very important that the Wildcats land Freeman soon. The problem with waiting on some of these players is the fact that the portal isn’t slowing down. If Pope targets two power forwards and misses on both of them, most of the good fours in the portal will be gone.
There will be some panic in Lexington if the Wildcats are not able to land Freeman, but I do believe the Wildcats are in a good spot to land the elite power forward. From the beginning, Freeman has been my top player for Kentucky in the portal, as he, plus Malachi Moreno, will give the Wildcats an elite frontcourt.
If Pope is able to land Freeman and Tyran Stokes to pair with Zoom Diallo, Alex Wilkins, Moreno, and Kam Williams, this could be the start of a really good team in Lexington. Hopefully, an announcement for where Freeman will transfer comes soon, and hopefully, this will be to play for Pope at Kentucky.
Fans of rival teams will say Pope “whiffed” on Rancik, but if this whiff was because the Wildcats are set to land Freeman soon, then it was more than worth it for Kentucky. If the Wildcats are able to land Freeman, it will officially be time for Big Blue Nation to start getting excited about the 2026-27 season. I expect a decision from Freeman to come within the next day or two.
Rancik would have been a solid backup four in Lexington but Freeman has been the guy from the beggining for this staff so if Kentucky lands him all is well. If the staff misses on Freeman not landing Rancik will look bad.
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Kentucky
Kentucky is poised to land either Donnie Freeman or Sebastian Rancik this weekend, per report
Jones posted on Twitter that “Kentucky will have (absent a major change) either Freeman or Rancik by tomorrow,” while also noting the Wildcats still need to add another shooter and another big to round out the roster.
One of the top targets is Donnie Freeman, a 6-foot-9, 205-pound sophomore forward transferring from Syracuse. Freeman arrived in Lexington on Tuesday night and began his visit on Wednesday before leaving without a commitment. While there was concern he could land at UConn, that visit has since been canceled, leaving Kentucky and St. John’s as the top teams.
Freeman averaged 16.5 points, 7.2 rebounds, and 1.3 assists per game last season, while adding nearly a block and a steal per contest. He shot 47.4% from the field but 30.2% from 3-point range across 23 games.
The other option is Sebastian Rancik, a 6-foot-11, 220-pound sophomore forward transferring from Colorado. Rancik visited Kentucky starting Wednesday through Thursday and brings a versatile skill set, averaging 12.3 points, 5.6 rebounds, and 2 assists per game while shooting 33.1% from 3.
Either Freeman or Rancik would provide a significant boost at the power forward position for head coach Mark Pope. Kentucky has already added guards Zoom Diallo and Alex Wilkins in the portal.
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