Mark Pope offers latest injury updates for Kentucky’s Quaintance, Lowe and Noah
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Jayden Quaintance's knee shows progress but lacks firm return timeline.
- Jaland Lowe exited after re-injuring his right shoulder; staff pursuing further consults.
- Noah is 'good' after banging knees
It was a rough 24 hours on the injury front for Mark Pope’s Kentucky Wildcats.
First, projected NBA lottery pick Jayden Quaintance was ruled out of UK’s game against Mississippi State on Saturday with swelling in his surgically repaired knee.
Then starting point guard Jaland Lowe injured his right shoulder — for the fourth time since October — before the first TV timeout of the game, and sophomore forward Trent Noah left with an injury after playing just six seconds toward the end of the Wildcats’ 92-68 victory.
At his weekly news conference Monday, Pope didn’t have firm timelines for either Lowe’s or Quaintance’s return but said Noah is “good” after he banged knees with another player.
“(Lowe) was in some pain yesterday,” Pope said. “And so we’re kind of doing consults. I was hoping that he was gonna wake up yesterday morning and just feel perfect, but he didn’t.”
Pope also said during his Monday press conference that UK had a meeting scheduled for 4 p.m. later that day to “maybe see what kind of game plan we can put together.” During that meeting, it was decided that Lowe would undergo surgery for his ailing right shoulder and miss the rest of Kentucky’s season.
The UK coach delivered that news on his weekly radio show Monday night.
Quaintance “has made progress” and is “feeling better,” Pope said Monday.
“That’s an ongoing thing, too, that we’re gonna probably figure (out) more about in the next couple days as we do consults,” Pope said.
Kentucky (10-6, 1-2 SEC) will play at LSU (12-4, 0-3) at 7 p.m. Wednesday.
Quaintance suffered a torn ACL as a freshman at Arizona State in February, underwent surgery for that injury in March and made his Kentucky debut Dec. 20, helping spark the Cats to a 78-66 victory over St. John’s.
The 6-foot-10 forward has been less effective in his three appearances since that debut, and he was listed as “out” on UK’s availability report the night before the Mississippi State game. Quaintance was on the bench for the victory over the Bulldogs.
Lowe ended up sitting next to Quaintance at the end of the UK bench Saturday night after leaving with 17:13 remaining in the first half. Lowe, who first injured his right shoulder during the team’s Blue-White scrimmage in October, left the court immediately after getting hurt again Saturday and did not return to the bench area until after halftime.
He also injured the same shoulder in practice on Nov. 13 and again during the St. John’s game, though he returned that day to help lead UK to a win in the second half.
Noah, who did not play in either of Kentucky’s first two SEC games — losses to Alabama and Missouri — checked into the Mississippi State game with 1:41 left and played just one defensive possession before calling to the bench for a substitution during a dead ball with 1:35 remaining.
The Harlan native has three starts this season, but he’s averaging just 1.8 points in 8.5 minutes per game in six appearances against high-major competition.
Kentucky will have to send its preliminary availability report for the LSU game to the SEC by 8 p.m. ET Tuesday, and the status of the injured Wildcats will be made public shortly after that time.
This story was originally published January 12, 2026 at 12:18 PM.
