‘You’ll see a breakthrough.’ Why confidence is crucial for Kentucky’s Teonni Key
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Teonni Key emerged as a core contributor in Kentucky’s first season under Brooks.
- Key, Strack and Hassett combined for nearly 47% of scoring and 71% of rebounds.
- Brooks emphasizes confidence and small details to unlock Key’s full potential.
Kenny Brooks tells rising senior and returning starter Teonni Key that “she needs to love herself as much as I love her.”
Confidence in sport, paired with a high-level skill set and undeniable talent, has helped lift even the most-touted athletes to monumental heights.
From Rory McIlroy, after years of trying, finally earning a green jacket this spring at Augusta, to Muhammad Ali’s underdog victory over George Foreman in 1974 to the Lithuanian men’s basketball team winning bronze at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics after the fall of the Soviet Union, proof exists at every level of sport that self-compassion and inner belief can be the ultimate difference-maker.
Key, who transferred to Kentucky last summer after three injury-riddled years at North Carolina, exploded onto the scene as part of the Wildcats’ eye-catching return to the national stage — one of five starters expected to carry the majority of the load as Brooks reworked what it meant to take the floor for UK in his inaugural season.
“Teonni, last year was her first year with a prominent role,” Brooks said. “Her first three at UNC, very limited. I don’t know if the confidence was there, if it was instilled in her. She got here last year, and it probably took her a while to understand that we all believed in her wholeheartedly, and we needed her to just go out there and play.”
Often referred to as the team’s “key to success” by Brooks and anyone at the intersection of loving basketball and puns, Key largely embraced last year’s influx of responsibility and challenge with style.
After playing a total of only 503 minutes during her redshirt freshman and sophomore seasons in Chapel Hill, Key’s typical averages of about 11 minutes, three points and three rebounds per game skyrocketed; the former top 10 national prospect and 2021 McDonald’s All-American stepped in and averaged 11.4 points, 8.3 rebounds, 1.5 assists and 1.7 blocks in 28.1 minutes per game during her debut season with Kentucky.
For the first time in her collegiate career, Key’s potential was consistently accessed, and she became an undeniable force for the Wildcats. An energy source. A dynamic option on both ends of the floor who could go coast-to-coast, despite her standing 6-foot-4.
Though in this era of college basketball retaining stars can be difficult, Key did not consider the transfer portal after last season. Instead, the Cary, North Carolina, native remained committed to laying the groundwork for a new Kentucky.
The decision to stay, Key said, “wasn’t a hard decision at all.”
“During my first year with the staff and Coach Brooks,” Key said. “Seeing them, learning them, knowing them, I think that was that. They’re one-in-a-million people, they’re great people on and off the court. So I think that wasn’t even anything to entertain, honestly, I knew this was home.”
Brooks will often discuss how Key can do things many college basketball players can’t do, but he recently noted how, when her personality takes over, she helps create the identity and energy of the team.
“Teonni showed us last year what she’s capable of doing, number one,” Brooks said. “But she was quickly our enforcer. If there was a little scuffle, Teonni had a whole different personality, and she was coming through like, ‘Don’t you mess with us.’”
That energy not only filtered throughout the roster, Brooks said, but helped combat outside narratives — particularly throughout the Southeastern Conference — that Kentucky was “tall and lean.” Kentucky’s “Triplets,” made up of Key, eventual SEC Defensive Player of the Year Clara Strack and Division I newcomer and grade-A hustler Amelia Hassett, did not, initially, jump off the scouting report for opposing coaching staffs.
With Key’s example, Brooks said, Strack followed suit. And suddenly, the Wildcats’ attitude became, “Yeah, we’re tall, we’re lean, but we’re also tough.”
“I’ve had coaches even tell me this,” Brooks said. “That we were a lot longer and more athletic than they anticipated. Because you watched people, and they tried to isolate us. They were like, ‘OK, well, they’re not as fast. We’re going to take them off the dribble.’ And all of a sudden we were blocking the shots, and Teonni was a big part of that.”
Key, Strack and Hassett combined for 46.7% of Kentucky’s scoring in its first season under Brooks, plus 70.85% of its rebounding. The trio also pushed UK to the top of the national shot-blocking rankings, as the Wildcats ended the year with a staggering 7.0 blocks per game.
As is often the case with a player thrust into a new situation — and, as a result, new expectations — Key’s season was far from perfect. In a year that featured 12 double-doubles, mind-bending offensive plays and textbook defensive stops, Key was often sidelined by foul trouble, and left frustrated and deterred when the game inevitably ebbed when the team needed it to flow.
Throughout the 2024-25 season, she would have a dominant game, even in the face of adversity, but a faltering of confidence would lie in wait to take down UK’s “key to success.”
The answer, according to Brooks? Placing a “big focus” on “doing the little things.”
Any moment of mismatch — be it in experience, build or physicality in the paint — or adversity on the floor can be broken down into smaller pieces for learning purposes.
“Like Coach Brooks says a lot of time,” Key said. “’It’s not how fast you do it, it’s how you do it.’ So just focusing on those little things and doing them well, and just getting stronger, being, like you said, ‘doing the dirty work,’ doing whatever the team needs, honestly, just being helpful in any way is what I strive to do.”
The Wildcats’ mentality entering year two of the Brooks era isn’t too far from “act like you’ve been here before” because, well, they have. A gauntlet of a first season, especially in a loaded SEC — a league known for producing dominant bigs and developing them for the next level — has highlighted areas in which Key would like to improve.
Key’s successful first season as a double-figure contributor came against unfamiliar faces in unfamiliar schemes, all the while balancing an increase in responsibility and usage and battling inconsistent confidence.
The year allowed Key to figure out “what we need and how I can help,” while reading the game in a now-familiar way. Her path to accessing that confidence is ongoing, but the foundation has been laid and the direction is clearer.
Because of that? Brooks’ hopes are high.
“I’m looking forward to bigger things for her this year,” Brooks said. “Because she’s going to love herself this year, and be really confident and go out there. And I think you’ll see a breakthrough.”
