Good news for Kentucky with the transfer portal deadline now one week away
Even by the standards of the college basketball transfer portal, this spring has been a circus.
From high-profile departures to surprise commitments to rumored seven-figure deals for role players — not to mention the eye-popping price tags (we’re talking $3-4 million) for projected stars — predicting who’s going where has been an exhausting exercise.
Portal season is known for its unpredictability, of course, but this one takes the cake.
Expect the unexpected is the general advice in college basketball this time of year.
And there has definitely been some of that to negatively affect Kentucky over the past couple of weeks. There was the about-face from San Diego State big man Magoon Gwath, who seemed on the verge of committing to the Cats before removing his name from the portal and returning to the Aztecs instead. More recently, there was the surprise decommitment of highly touted guard Acaden Lewis, who signed with the Wildcats last fall. And Tuesday, former Sam Houston guard Lamar Wilkerson chose Indiana over Kentucky.
The good news for Mark Pope and Kentucky is that — when it comes to roster retention — everything has gone exactly according to plan. So far.
And that’s a great sign for the Cats with an important deadline now just one week away.
While transfers can make their college decisions at any time, players entering the portal must do so by 11:59 p.m. EDT on April 22. As of now, all five of the Wildcats that Pope was hoping to retain for the 2025-26 season are still with the program.
The only defection has been Kerr Kriisa, who had been presumed to be gone from Kentucky for weeks before actually entering his name in the portal less than 72 hours after the Wildcats’ season-ending loss to Tennessee in the NCAA Tournament.
It has now been more than two and a half weeks since that defeat, and Otega Oweh, Brandon Garrison, Collin Chandler, Trent Noah and Travis Perry are all still on UK’s projected 2025-26 roster.
By all accounts from people around the Wildcats’ program, Garrison was the biggest wild card going into portal season. However, the 6-foot-10 forward revealed Saturday night that he would be back with the Cats for next season.
The timing of that announcement was not coincidental. Garrison posted his “I’m back” statement five days after Jayden Quaintance — a 6-10 post player, projected as a possible NBA lottery pick — committed to Kentucky and just hours after 6-11 forward Andrija Jelavic, a Croatian prospect who will turn 21 years old next month, picked the Wildcats.
Even before those additions, there was plenty of buzz that Garrison was considering hitting the transfer portal after just one season in Lexington, and that talk only intensified after Quaintance and Jelavic jumped aboard.
That made Garrison’s statement all the more striking. And it greatly shortened the odds that Pope will indeed be able to get all five of those players back for next season.
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Oweh was UK’s leading scorer in year one of the Pope era and is expected to be back for his senior season. He could still enter his name in the NBA draft — the deadline for that is April 26 — but he’s not currently projected as a pick this year.
Chandler, who emerged as a key reserve for the Cats down the stretch this past season, was long rumored to be looking at a possible move back to his home state of Utah, but he’s given every indication that he will return to UK for his sophomore year. He’s expected to play a major role on Pope’s 2025-26 roster.
And while Noah and Perry are seemingly getting pushed further down the depth chart with each new portal addition, the two Kentucky natives were the most adamant regarding their intention to return to UK of anyone in the Wildcats’ postgame locker room after the loss to Tennessee.
The two freshmen made those statements knowing that Pope would be bringing in several new transfers. They also spoke with the knowledge that they would be able to earn opportunities to get onto the court, with both players playing key roles in important games this past season.
UK is not expected to make any formal announcements that players will be staying with the program, leaving the assumption that those Wildcats will be back unless they say otherwise. With all of the buzz surrounding a possible departure, Garrison’s personal statement that he’d return made sense as a way to quiet that talk. As for the rest, no news remains good news for UK.
So, with a week to go until that portal deadline, Pope’s projected roster sits at 12 players. Kentucky is expected to add one more to that group. And if the rest of the roster holds together between now and April 22, the Wildcats will have a team capable of competing for a banner in 2026.
Lamar Wilkerson chooses IU over UK
The top candidate to fill the 13th roster spot for Kentucky was former Sam Houston guard Lamar Wilkerson, who began an official visit to Lexington on Sunday — with a trip to Keeneland on the early itinerary — before spending Monday on UK’s campus and having dinner with the Wildcats’ staff that night.
The plan was for Wilkerson to travel to Auburn later Monday night for one last college visit there, but he called that trip off while he was still in Lexington, turning this recruitment into a two-team race. However, he ended up choosing the Hoosiers on Tuesday afternoon.
Wilkerson — a 6-foot-5 guard from Arkansas — averaged 20.5 points per game and shot 109-for-245 (44.5%) from 3-point range this past season. He’s also an 82.6% free throw shooter on 224 career attempts over three years in college. 247Sports has Wilkerson as the No. 42 player in the 2025 transfer portal rankings.
Ex-Kentucky player in the portal
Add one more ex-Cat to the list of players in the college basketball transfer portal.
Ugonna Onyenso, who spent his first two seasons at Kentucky — and started 14 games for the Wildcats during John Calipari’s final season as coach — is leaving Kansas State after one year.
Onyenso made only two starts in 24 appearances for Kansas State, which finished 16-17 and missed the postseason. He averaged 2.8 points, 2.4 rebounds and 0.9 blocks in 11.1 minutes per game for the Big 12 Wildcats.
In his final season at Kentucky, the 7-foot center averaged 3.6 points, 4.8 rebounds and 2.8 blocks in 18.8 minutes per game. He joined Nerlens Noel as just the second player in school history to record double-digit blocks in a game — becoming the first to do it in Rupp Arena — with 10 in a victory over Ole Miss.
Onyenso is the 10th former Wildcat to hit the transfer portal this spring, joining Kerr Kriisa, Aaron Bradshaw, Jordan Burks, Zvonimir Ivisic, Daimion Collins, Dontaie Allen, Bryce Hopkins, Devin Askew and Cam’Ron Fletcher.
Acaden Lewis update
Star combo guard Acaden Lewis, who decommitted from Kentucky on Thursday night, has begun his search for a new school.
Lewis was at St. John’s for a recruiting visit Monday as coach Rick Pitino looks to add to his roster for the 2025-26 season. The Red Storm won their first outright Big East regular-season championship in 40 years in Pitino’s second season as head coach, and St. John’s is once again projected to be a national contender in 2025-26.
Lewis is ranked by 247Sports as the No. 35 recruit in the 2025 class. Maryland and Villanova (now led by ex-Terrapins coach Kevin Willard) have also been viewed as potential landing spots for the Washington, D.C., native.
UK basketball targets still looking
A few transfer portal players strongly linked to Kentucky over the past couple of weeks appear to be headed elsewhere, with some likely favorites emerging in each recruitment.
Former Indiana forward Mackenzie Mgbako — a five-star recruit in high school — visited N.C. State over the weekend, and the Wolfpack are looking like the front-runners, though his situation remains fluid.
Mgbako is one of just three transfers to visit UK this spring, but he’s no longer considered a Kentucky target. The other two visitors were Taylor Bol Bowen, who has since committed to Alabama, and Wilkerson.
Before UK landed Croatian recruit Andrija Jelavic and got the news that Brandon Garrison would definitely be back for next season, former Robert Morris forward Alvaro Folgueiras had emerged as a possible frontcourt addition.
Now that Kentucky is full at those post positions, Folgueiras is looking elsewhere. He visited Iowa over the weekend, and Providence and Villanova are also on his list.
Former Jacksonville State guard Jaron Pierre Jr. — once a candidate to fill that backcourt spot on UK’s roster — committed to SMU late Monday night. He was no longer considered a Kentucky target.
And Purdue point guard Braden Smith, who was the subject of transfer rumors for weeks — along with speculation that, if he did enter the portal, Kentucky would be one of the favorites — announced Monday afternoon that he would be staying with the Boilermakers for his senior season.
UK has already added former Pittsburgh point guard Jaland Lowe out of the transfer portal this month. Lowe is listed as the No. 7 point guard in the 247Sports transfer rankings.
This story was originally published April 15, 2025 at 5:00 AM.
