Kentucky
Starting 5: Olympic champions highlight Kentucky’s 2024 Hall class, Jay Bilas to lecture
Kentucky’s 2024 Hall of Fame inductees include Olympic and NCAA champions.
Jasmine Camacho-Quinn (2016-2018 track and field), John Cropp (administrator/coach), Henrik Larsen (2018 rifle), Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone (2018 track and field), Jodie Meeks (2007-2009 men’s basketball) and Corey Peters (2006-2009 football) recently were chosen.
The new Wildcats Hall of Famers will be inducted during Hall of Fame Weekend on Sept. 20-21.
Camacho-Quinn is the first athlete in Puerto Rico history to win two Olympic medals. She won gold in the 100-meter hurdles at the Tokyo Olympics and bronze at the Paris Olympics. At UK, she was a two-time NCAA champion in the 100 hurdles and was part of the 2017 4×100 relay team that finished first at the national meet. She holds the program record in the 100 hurdles.
Cropp worked in multiple roles in UK athletics during his 22-year tenure. One of his most prominent accomplishments was being a founding administrator for the Kentucky softball program in 1997. After he retired, the softball stadium was named after him in 2013.
Larsen won a gold medal in the smallbore competition at the 2022 ISSF World Championships. In one year with the Wildcats, he won the 2018 NCAA air rifle individual national championship and set program records in smallbore, air rifle and aggregate. He was named the 2018 NCAA Shooter of the Year and NCAA Freshman of the Year.
McLaughlin-Levrone is a four-time Olympic gold medalist and holds the 400 hurdles world record. In one year at Kentucky, she was an NCAA champion in the 400 hurdles and broke the collegiate record (52.75 seconds). She was an SEC champion in the indoor 400 and outdoor 400 hurdles and 4×400 relay.
Meeks played on seven teams in 10 seasons in the NBA. He holds Kentucky’s single-season record for 3-pointers made (117) and has the second-most points scored in a season (854).
Peters played 13 years in the NFL with the Atlanta Falcons, Arizona Cardinals and Jacksonville Jaguars. In his senior year at Kentucky, he recorded 56 tackles, including 12 for loss, and four sacks. He earned All-SEC first-team honors and was named UK’s Outstanding Defensive Player.
Louisville women’s golf head coach Whitney Young will be inducted into the Class of 2024 Kentucky Golf Hall of Fame.
Young competed for Glasgow High School in the 1994 Kentucky State Championships as a fourth grader. At 13 years old, she became the youngest winner of the Kentucky Amateur in 1998. She also won the 1999 and 2000 titles.
She was a four-time AJGA Polo Golf All-American and represented the United States in the 2002 PING Junior Solheim Cup.
Young was a three-time National Golf Coaches Association All-American at Georgia and a four-time first-team All-SEC honoree.
Young started as an assistant coach with the Cardinals, but she has been the head coach for the last five years. Young has led the Cardinals to two regionals. In 2021, they hosted the regional for the first time in program history.
More information on the ceremony will be released later.
More: Louisville’s Valhalla Golf Club to host Solheim Cup. What to know about LPGA Tour event
ESPN college basketball analyst Jay Bilas will give a lecture Sept. 6 at Bellarmine’s Frazier Hall.
Bilas plans to discuss name, image and likeness activities in Division I sports, the transfer portal and the evolving landscape of college sports.
The lecture is scheduled to start at 4 p.m., and admission is free. Those who plan to attend are asked to register by Sept. 2 at the Wyatt Lecture registration site.
Louisville basketball mailbag: Which players stood out in Pat Kelsey’s unofficial debut?
Trinity High School senior pitcher Colton Cravens recently announced his commitment to Northwestern.
As a junior, Cravens struck out 26 batters and recorded four wins with a 2.30 ERA in 24 ⅓ innings.
Kentucky high school football preview: What to know about Louisville-area teams, players
- Racing Louisville FC will host Chicago Red Stars at 7:30 p.m. Saturday.
- Louisville City FC will visit Hartford Athletic at 7 p.m. Saturday.
- The Louisville Bats will host the Gwinnett Stripers in a six-game series. Games begin at 6:35 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday and at 7:15 p.m. Friday and Saturday. The last game of the series is scheduled for 1:05 p.m. Aug. 25.
- Louisville men’s soccer will host Jacksonville at 5 p.m. Thursday.
- Louisville women’s soccer will host New Hampshire at 7:30 p.m. Thursday. Then, the Cardinals will visit Northern Kentucky at 5 p.m. Aug. 25.
- Bellarmine men’s soccer will host Evansville at 7 p.m. Thursday. Then, the Knights will visit Northern Kentucky at 7:30 p.m. Aug. 25.
- Bellarmine women’s soccer will host Asbury at 3 p.m. Aug. 25.
Know of a story you think should be included in our weekly Starting 5 notebook? Send your idea to sports reporter Prince James Story at pstory@gannett.com for consideration. You can follow him on X at @PrinceJStory.
The Brooklyn Nets have developed their teams through a number of strategies over the decades, and their front office has put together considerable success through the NBA draft. Many of the franchise’s best players have joined the Nets either by being selected directly in the annual draft or through trades made on that day.
Moreover, it is not only the star players who have been acquired by the Nets through the draft. Several prominent alumni have been selected by the team each offseason during this annual event, with certain colleges being more prominently represented than others. An analysis of the players from different schools reveals that both prestigious programs and smaller institutions have contributed top talent to the Nets’ roster over the years.
So without further ado, let’s take a look at every player who has been drafted by the Nets out of Kentucky State University.
Gerald Cunningham – forward
Draft year and position: fifth round (first pick, 89th overall), 1977 NBA Draft
Seasons at Kentucky State University:
Seasons played with Nets: did not make the team
All stats and data courtesy of Basketball Reference.
The best shooter in college basketball will, in fact, stay in college basketball — and Kentucky is ready to make its final push.
Iowa State star Milan Momcilovic has withdrawn from the 2026 NBA Draft and will play somewhere at his current level in 2026-27. That’s not expected to be back in Ames, as Cyclone coach T.J. Otzelberger made clear, saying that if the 6-8 forward doesn’t make the jump to the pros, “it’s important that he’s able to find a landing spot at a college that fits what he’s looking for.”
Could Lexington be that final destination? The perimeter sniper already said he’s got respect for the Wildcats and Mark Pope, watching his programs closely since his time at BYU when they competed against each other in the Big 12.
In his eyes, he could be the piece Kentucky was missing this past season in the program’s Round of 32 exit, led by Momcilovic’s 20 points and five rebounds in the Cyclones’ 82-63 victory in St. Louis.
“I think Kentucky would be a good fit,” Momcilovic told the Herald-Leader’s Ben Roberts last week at the NBA Draft Combine. “I obviously went against Pope at BYU his first year (in the Big 12), and I loved how his team played. I think we went 1-1 against them, but they killed us at their place, because they fly the ball up the court and shoot 3s. I really like the way they play.
“And obviously, Kentucky last year, he didn’t have enough shooters around him to really coach, I feel like, the way he wanted. But I think — if I were to choose Kentucky — that would be a good fit for me. I feel like I’d be a great player for him, and he’d be a good coach for me.”
Momcilovic averaged a career-high 16.9 points, 3.1 rebounds and 1.0 assists in 30.5 minutes per game while shooting 50.6 percent from the field, 48.7 percent from three and 87.8 percent at the line. He knocked down 260 3-pointers, good for 3.7 makes on 7.5 attempts per contest.
The former four-star recruit has been Kentucky’s dream portal target all offseason. Now, he’s officially a free agent, pulling out of the draft ahead of the withdrawal deadline.
On Tuesday, head coach Mark Pope revealed that there will likely be no summer trip for the 2026-27 Wildcats.
“We’re probably a lean towards not going right now,” Pope told Darrell Bird of Cats Pause.
The NCAA recently adopted a proposal that will allow schools to take summer tours every year after the rules previously limited schools to one trip every four years. Even if it ended up being somewhere close by, this would’ve been a great experience for the Cats to get some exhibition games in, especially with the roster overhaul they’re going through.
Oh well. The good news is UK will still have plenty of summer practices to develop and build chemistry.
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