Why Kentucky basketball needs Milan Momcilovic so badly for the 2026-27 season
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Mark Pope said 'Yes' when asked if he'd try for 30-plus 3s per game.
- Milan Momcilovic made 136 threes and shot 48.7%, leading the NCAA.
- No current Kentucky player on the projected roster matches Momcilovic's 3-point numbers.
The final edition of Mark Pope’s series of video Q&As with Kentucky fans on social media two weeks ago featured a handful of basketball questions that elicited fairly lengthy responses.
But on one of those basketball questions, Pope got straight to the point.
“Are you actually going to try for 30-plus 3s a game?” a UK fan asked.
“Yes,” Pope responded.
Nothing else to add. And then it was on to the next one.
Pope’s oft-discussed desire to put up a whole bunch of 3-pointers at Kentucky — that target has typically been set at 35, though sometimes the UK coach has said 30 — hasn’t worked out so far.
His final team at BYU offered up a 3-point barrage on a nightly basis, averaging 32.0 attempts per game, a number that ranked No. 1 among major conference teams. That’s the type of perimeter attack UK fans thought they were getting with the offensive-minded coach.
In Pope’s first season in Lexington, the Cats averaged 25.3 3-point attempts per game, ranking No. 78 nationally. Last season, they put up just 23.9 long-range shots per game, ranking No. 154 in the country and ninth in the SEC.
Pope’s unequivocal statement that he’s running it back with the goal of shooting 30-plus 3s per game is an interesting one, considering the personnel on his projected 2026-27 roster, which doesn’t appear built to achieve such a number.
Milan Momcilovic could change all of that.
The former Iowa State forward removed his name from the NBA draft just before the withdrawal deadline Wednesday night, and Kentucky, Louisville and St. John’s have been the three teams tied to his recruitment the most in recent weeks. A college decision is expected rather quickly.
U of L and St. John’s have already built formidable rosters for next season. CBS Sports ranks Pat Kelsey’s Cards at No. 14 and Rick Pitino’s Red Storm at No. 16 on its latest preseason Top 25 list, and that was before St. John’s got a commitment from former Baylor guard Tounde Yessoufou at the NBA draft deadline late Wednesday night.
Those two teams should be contenders whether they land Momcilovic or not.
Kentucky, on the other hand, has been absent from such lists for the entirety of the preseason, and Momcilovic appears to be Pope’s last hope of putting the Cats in the national rankings.
Being unranked in the preseason doesn’t ensure mediocrity, to be clear. North Carolina was No. 1 in the 2022-23 preseason poll. The Tar Heels missed the NCAA Tournament altogether. UConn wasn’t included in those preseason rankings. The Huskies won the national title anyway.
But the late addition of Momcilovic would vastly improve the optics surrounding Pope’s program and likely vault the Cats into top-15 territory in those preseason rankings at the same time.
The 6-foot-8 forward would also give Pope a legitimate reason to believe that his Cats could become the 3-point machine he’s envisioned since taking the job two years ago.
Momcilovic was simply the best perimeter shooter in the sport last season. He made 136 3-pointers in 37 games. He shot 48.7% from the perimeter. He led the NCAA in both of those categories.
There’s no one on Kentucky’s 2026-27 roster that has come close to those numbers.
Momcilovic put up 279 3-point attempts as a junior for the Cyclones last season. That comes out to 7.5 attempts per game, which would account for a quarter of Pope’s stated goal, and it seems likely that he would shoot even more 3s as a Wildcat if the UK coach can get his offense humming at near BYU levels.
Transfer guard Alex Wilkins is the only player on UK’s current roster that attempted more than 100 3-pointers at the college level last season, and he made just 32.8% of his 198 shots as a freshman at Furman.
Ousmane N’Diaye — a 6-11 forward — attempted 141 3s over 28 games in Italy’s top professional league, but he shot an even-worse 30.5% this past season.
The next most-prolific college shooter on UK’s roster is James Madison transfer Justin McBride, a 6-7, 240-pound forward who is expected to share duties at the 4 spot with N’Diaye. McBride shot 40.0% on 95 attempts, though he was just 20 for 79 from deep (25.3%) in two seasons at Nevada and Oklahoma State before that.
Washington State transfer Jerone Morton shot 38.7% on 80 attempts last season. He’ll play a reserve role in UK’s backcourt. Zoom Diallo, the Cats’ likely starting point guard, made just 31.5% of his 75 attempts at Washington last season.
Kentucky native Reece Potter, who shot 36.7% on 60 attempts at Miami (Ohio) in 2024-25 before redshirting at UK last season, has shown an ability to be an outside threat, but it’s unclear how much the 7-1 forward will play for the Cats, who also have N’Diaye, McBride and centers Malachi Moreno and Franck Kepnang in the frontcourt.
Ditto for returning wing Trent Noah, whose shooting ability is better than his 33.3% (on 51 attempts) last season would indicate but could once again struggle to find playing time at UK.
Pope will also bring back 6-8 wings Kam Williams and Braydon Hawthorne, and they could be his best hope for approaching that “30 3s” goal next season.
Williams attempted only 78 3s last season, but he was limited to 24 games due to a broken foot and was clearly getting more comfortable on the court before suffering that injury. He shot 41.2% on 153 long-range attempts as a freshman at Tulane.
Hawthorne sat out last season as a redshirt, but he often wowed spectators at Rupp Arena with his pregame shooting routines, and UK coaches and players have talked about his 3-point prowess behind the scenes.
Both players should get plenty of run for the Cats next season, and both will have the green light from the perimeter. Some of the Kentucky newcomers could step up, too.
There are metrics that suggest Wilkins will improve as a 3-point shooter in Year 2 of college, especially if opposing defenses are forced to concentrate on other scoring threats. N’Diaye’s percentages could improve with a more focused approach to perimeter shooting. A more wide-open offense might lead others to boost their attempts and hit rate.
But what if Wilkins and/or Williams don’t take that expected step forward? Or Hawthorne struggles to adapt to the speed and physicality of the college game? Or N’Diaye proves to be the subpar shooter he was last season? Or McBride’s numbers revert to something closer to those first two seasons spent at higher NCAA levels?
Pope needs more than hope to deliver on his promise of 3-point potency.
Momcilovic offers proven results. The 21-year-old is also sharp enough to see what Pope has been trying to do and understand why it hasn’t succeeded so far at Kentucky.
Each of the past two seasons have been riddled with injuries to key perimeter players, with Lamont Butler, Jaland Lowe, Kerr Kriisa, Jaxson Robinson and Williams all suffering season-ending or otherwise serious injuries.
Each of those setbacks has negatively affected UK’s 3-point attack, either through taking potent shooters off the court or sidelining key playmakers who could’ve opened the floor for others to let it fly.
At the NBA Combine in Chicago two weeks ago, Momcilovic, who played against Pope’s final BYU team twice as a freshman, spoke highly of the head coach’s offensive philosophy there. He also scouted last season’s UK team ahead of Iowa State’s victory over the Cats in the NCAA Tournament in March, and he could tell how the personnel on that roster had altered Pope’s approach.
“He didn’t have enough shooters around him to really coach, I feel like, the way he wanted,” Momcilovic said. “But I think — if I were to choose Kentucky — that would be a good fit for me.”
The fit is there. So is the need. And now Pope will wait on Momcilovic to make a decision. The direction of his third season as Kentucky’s coach could very well be riding on it.
