After swapping South Carolina for Kentucky, how has Trent Noah fared this season for UK?
About nine months ago, Trent Noah’s college basketball journey took an abrupt detour back home.
Noah was a bona fide star player at Harlan County High School in Eastern Kentucky. The 6-foot-5 Noah scored in bunches for the Black Bears, tallying 3,707 career points at the school, which is unofficially the fifth-most all-time in Kentucky high school boys basketball history.
After leading Harlan County on a stirring run to the championship game of last year’s Sweet 16 state tournament — during which Noah averaged 32.3 points per game — plenty of people were interested in the upcoming college career of Noah, who was ranked as a four-star recruit and as the No. 110 national prospect in the 2024 recruiting class.
Noah had committed to South Carolina in October 2023 and signed to play for the Gamecocks and head coach Lamont Paris that November.
That was the plan for Noah, who will go down as one of the best Kentucky high school players in modern history.
Well, plans change.
Almost four weeks after Kentucky officially announced Mark Pope would be the next head coach of the Wildcats, taking over from John Calipari after his 15 seasons on the job, Noah announced that he would be backing out of his pledge to play at South Carolina.
Less than two days later, Noah — who set a Boys’ Sweet 16 record last year by making 19 3-pointers at the state tournament — was committed to UK.
For the first time, Noah is set to face the school that he was planning on playing for when No. 14 Kentucky (15-7 overall, 4-5 SEC) hosts South Carolina (10-12, 0-9) on Saturday afternoon in Rupp Arena.
And — compared to what most outsiders had set as preseason expectations — Noah could play an outsized role for the Wildcats against the school that first recruited him to play in the SEC.
Noah has played in 10 games for Kentucky this season, including in three of UK’s nine conference contests. He’s had some notable performances against these high-major opponents.
Noah had two points, four rebounds and a steal in 12 minutes in a road loss at Vanderbilt late last month, which marked his first in-game appearances for the Cats in nearly a month. During Kentucky’s all-hands-on-deck win at Tennessee on Jan. 28, Noah played nine minutes off the bench and scored five points.
There wasn’t a whole lot of good for Kentucky on Tuesday night during a demoralizing 98-84 loss at No. 25 Ole Miss, but Noah did play a career-high 13 minutes.
The Harlan County native is clearly getting his shot with the Wildcats, both a result of his individual talent and Kentucky’s current injury situation, with veteran guards Lamont Butler and Kerr Kriisa both sidelined and forward Andrew Carr still progressing from a back injury.
“He’s a special young man. He’s a terrific basketball player. He’s been really good for us,” Pope said of Noah during his Thursday press conference. “He’s been good for us on the court in games, on the court in practice and in the locker room. He’s like a sponge. He just learns so fast. He really takes in information and he’ll execute after one conversation, which is a tremendous skill. He’s going to be a great player.”
Trent Noah is among UK freshmen getting major playing time
Regardless of individual performance, things have gone better from a team perspective for Noah this season at Kentucky, compared to the situation South Carolina finds itself in.
Last fall, Noah originally committed to South Carolina from a final group of schools that also included Butler, Dayton, Saint Louis, Seton Hall, Stanford, Richmond and Western Kentucky.
The Gamecocks are the only SEC school still without a win in league play this season, although they’re still a respectable 76th in the nation in the KenPom metrics. Paris’ team — which has lost five of its nine SEC games by five points or fewer — has a week off before Saturday’s game in Lexington.
While Noah has seen significant playing time of late for Kentucky, there’s still no guarantee that he will see the floor. Noah didn’t play for Kentucky last weekend during UK’s emotional home loss to ex-coach Calipari and Arkansas. Postgame, Pope was directly asked why Noah didn’t play.
“Trent is actually super interesting to me,” Pope began. “With (Carr) coming back and Ansley (Almonor) playing so well. I wonder if there is some space for Trent, actually at the 3 and I think that’s something to explore, as we kind of reconfigure everything we are doing right now on the fly. He’s played well and there’s definitely space for him and it’s my job to find the right space.”
Pope found space for Noah on Tuesday at Ole Miss. Noah checked into that game less than four minutes after it began, but with Kentucky already in a 10-4 hole.
And while Noah got his most playing time of the season at Ole Miss, he also failed to record a single box score statistic. The Wildcats were outscored by two points during Noah’s 13 minutes on the court.
During his weekly radio show Wednesday night, Pope was asked about Noah and how the Harlan County native fits into UK’s rotation and substitution patterns.
“He’s such a terrific talent. He’s such a beautiful kid,” Pope said, before explaining that the UK coaching staff is still attempting to strike a balance between maintaining the Wildcats’ elite offense (second in the nation, per KenPom) while also addressing UK’s porous defense (108th in the nation, per KenPom).
“... Trent certainly gives us some support on both sides of the ball. When we’re constructing lineups as we’re going through the game, there are so many factors that impact rotations, but he is becoming more and more of a reliable piece. He’s got a tremendous future at the University of Kentucky. I do think when he’s on the floor, good things happen. I’m a massive fan of his as a person and the way he approaches his game. He’s been so fantastic. So he’s really helping us.”
Of course, Noah isn’t the only freshman who has been thrust into a more-prominent than expected role for UK of late. So too have first-year guards Travis Perry — whose Lyon County team bested Noah’s Harlan County squad in last year’s Sweet 16 title game — and Collin Chandler.
Perry is averaging 7.9 minutes per game in SEC play for the Cats. Recently, Chandler played 15 minutes at Tennessee and 17 minutes against Arkansas, before seeing his playing time slashed to just three minutes at Ole Miss.
“They’re really good players. Collin and Travis are really good players, and Trent also,” Pope said Tuesday night after the Ole Miss debacle. “They’re really, really talented, good players, and certainly they don’t have a ton of experience, but they’re good players and they’re going to get better every single second they’re out on the floor. It’s a little bit of a painful process for us right now, but that’s growing. We have a lot of faith in those guys. They’re making contributions, and they’ll continue to make bigger and bigger contributions.”
Saturday
South Carolina at No. 14 Kentucky
When: Noon
TV: ESPN2
Radio: WLAP-AM 630, WBUL-FM 98.1
Records: South Carolina 10-12 (0-9 SEC), Kentucky 15-7 (4-5)
Series: Kentucky leads 54-15
Last meeting: South Carolina won 79-62 on Jan. 23, 2024, in Columbia, S.C.
This story was originally published February 6, 2025 at 12:42 PM.
