What is Kentucky basketball’s injury outlook for Oklahoma game?
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Kentucky basketball is set to be without three players for home game against Oklahoma.
- UK will be missing guard Jaland Lowe, wing Kam Williams and forward Jayden Quaintance.
- Lowe is out for the season, while Williams and Quaintance could still return for UK.
Once again, the Kentucky men’s basketball team appears to be down to only nine scholarship players for an SEC game.
A trio of UK players was listed on the school’s availability report ahead of Wednesday night’s matchup between Kentucky (15-7 overall, 6-3 in the SEC) and Oklahoma (11-11, 1-8) at Rupp Arena.
Junior guard Jaland Lowe, sophomore wing Kam Williams and sophomore forward Jayden Quaintance are all out for Mark Pope’s team for the contest against the Sooners.
None of this injury news was a surprise.
Lowe has been ruled out for the season due to a series of right shoulder injuries that required surgery. Lowe underwent surgery last week.
Williams is also dealing with a long-term injury after breaking his foot last month during a home win over Texas.
“There’s maybe an outside, outside, outside chance that Kam could rejoin us at some point this season,” Pope said last week.
Last week, Pope said Quaintance is “on full shutdown” from on-court work due to swelling in his surgically repaired knee. The 6-foot-10 Quaintance tore his ACL last season as a freshman at Arizona State, and he joined Kentucky as an offseason transfer while still in the early stages of rehabbing that injury.
Quaintaince — who has only appeared in four games this season for UK, and none since Jan. 7 — will miss his eighth straight game for Kentucky on Wednesday.
“We’re doing everything we can with the performance team. One of the things — just in the immediate moment, (that’s a) challenge — is that every day he misses, he loses some of the strength that they worked so hard to develop,” Pope said last week about Quaintance’s injury.
Despite hardly playing for the Cats this season, the 18-year-old Quaintance is still projected as a lottery pick in this summer’s NBA draft.
With these players out, Pope is set to only have nine scholarship players at his disposal against the Sooners.
Kentucky has thus far preserved redshirt seasons for two players, freshman forward Braydon Hawthorne and junior forward Reece Potter. There’s been plenty of speculation surrounding a potential late-season appearance from the 6-foot-8 Hawthorne, but so far Pope hasn’t played the West Virginia native.
Recently, Pope has said that Hawthorne hasn’t been at full health while dealing with a calf issue and a sprained ankle.
Head coach Porter Moser’s Oklahoma team has lost eight straight games in league play, but the Sooners have a clean bill of health for Wednesday. All Oklahoma players are available to play against Kentucky.
The game between Kentucky and Oklahoma will start at 9 p.m. and be broadcast on ESPN2.
This story was originally published February 3, 2026 at 8:11 PM.
