Caleb Wilson’s ready to make his college basketball commitment. What are UK’s chances?
One of the top college basketball recruits in the class of 2025 is set to make his commitment late Thursday night.
It’s a recruitment that Kentucky has seemingly fallen behind in, after once occupying the role of the favorite.
Five-star power forward Caleb Wilson — a 6-foot-9, 205-pound prospect from Atlanta — will be choosing between Kentucky and North Carolina.
Wilson will announce his college choice Thursday night on the “NBA on TNT” program following a broadcast of the NBA matchup between the Boston Celtics and the Los Angeles Lakers. That game, which will be played in Los Angeles, isn’t set to tip off until 10 p.m. EST, which means Wilson’s college decision may not be revealed until the early hours of Friday morning.
Ranked by the 247Sports Composite as the No. 6 overall player in the 2025 recruiting group, Wilson is one of the last remaining five-star recruits in the high school senior class to settle on a college destination. And for a while, it looked likely that UK was going to be the choice for Wilson, a longtime Kentucky recruiting target.
UK’s pursuit of Wilson began under former head coach John Calipari. The Wildcats first extended a UK scholarship offer in June 2023, and Wilson visited Big Blue Madness — the annual Kentucky basketball kickoff event at Rupp Arena — in October 2023.
Current Kentucky coach Mark Pope was slow to resume UK’s recruitment of Wilson after taking over in April, but that didn’t stop Pope and his coaching staff from quickly asserting themselves as the perceived leader in Wilson’s recruitment.
Wilson took an official visit to UK in September. That trip included UK football’s home game against Georgia, time spent watching a UK basketball practice and a stop at Keeneland.
The good vibes between Wilson and the Cats continued into the fall. Wilson was on hand in November at Atlanta’s State Farm Arena for Kentucky’s comeback win against Duke in the Champions Classic.
Later in November, Wilson trimmed his list of schools to five: Central Florida, Kentucky, North Carolina, Ohio State and Tennessee. Last Friday, that group went from five schools to three, with Central Florida and Tennessee being dropped.
On Thursday morning, it was reported that Ohio State was no longer in the running for Wilson, a player who is viewed as a strong defender with plenty of offensive upside.
“I would expect his defense and transition play to translate best to the college level,” Zach Welch, an analyst for Pro Insight Basketball, told the Herald-Leader about Wilson. “He generates plenty of chaos as a defender, between his activity in the passing lanes, versatile rim protection and switchability. He also is at his best offensively when he can get out in the open court and run.”
As Wilson pared down his recruitment, Kentucky shifted from the perceived leader to being part of a neck-and-neck battle with North Carolina for Wilson’s commitment.
Recent developments have gone in favor of the Tar Heels.
Travis Branham — the 247Sports national basketball analyst known for his precise recruiting predictions — has logged a prediction for Wilson to commit to North Carolina. Branham boasts a 94% all-time success rate when it comes to logging “Crystal Ball” predictions for recruits.
“Despite all of the noise around Kentucky, I remain steadfast in my initial prediction,” Branham said Saturday of his North Carolina pick, according to 247Sports.
Kentucky and North Carolina are pursuing Caleb Wilson
The stakes are high for both programs, Kentucky and North Carolina, that are still hoping to land Wilson’s commitment.
Pope and Kentucky already have three players signed in the 2025 recruiting class: guards Jasper Johnson and Acaden Lewis, and center Malachi Moreno. According to the 247Sports Composite, this incoming recruiting class for UK ranks fifth in the country, just behind Calipari’s new school, Arkansas.
Pope’s first season as the Kentucky coach has brought a number of significant on-court wins, with the Wildcats boasting a 6-4 record in Quad 1 games, according to the NCAA NET rankings.
The Wildcats are also playing an attractive style of basketball that has endeared the program to fans and recruits. UK ranks third in the country in adjusted offensive efficiency and 31st in adjusted tempo, both per KenPom.
“Just the versatility that Pope has in his offense would allow him to say, ‘Hey, we can use (Wilson) in a number of different ways here, and really use your versatility,’” David Sisk — a basketball analyst for Rivals who covers both Kentucky and North Carolina — told the Herald-Leader last month.
Sisk said Wilson’s upbringing as a post player, before he began focusing on his perimeter game in recent years, has helped his overall skill set.
“… I think now you’re looking at some things starting to click. I know definitely his ball handling, that’s the one thing I noticed (improve) … That’s what Pope wants out of his bigs, obviously.”
Kentucky’s existing signees in the 2025 recruiting class have done their part to try and lure Wilson to Lexington, with those efforts being led by Lewis, a four-star point guard from Washington, D.C.
Lewis and Wilson are close friends. They have posted cryptically on social media in recent months, indicating a desire to play together in college.
“I see (Wilson) in Andrew Carr’s role, whereas Moreno is probably going to be like Amari Williams and Brandon Garrison,” Sisk said when projecting Wilson’s potential addition to next season’s UK team.
“… There’s so many roll situations for (Wilson). Just as athletic and as long as he is, I think he would be tremendous in handoff and rolls, ball screen and rolls, throwing lobs, catching the ball and finishing. I think he would just be great in those spots, but also dribbling his man down to the block and then going one-on-one inside.”
Securing commitments from Johnson, Lewis and Moreno has given Pope credibility on the recruiting trail, but he’s yet to land the kind of expected one-and-done NBA talent that Wilson represents.
During Pope’s nine combined seasons as the head coach at Utah Valley and BYU, he never oversaw a future NBA draft pick.
What would a commitment from Wilson mean for Pope and Kentucky basketball recruiting?
“He’s a guy that I feel like (Kentucky) needs to get. Because if you get him, then you’ve got the confidence to say, ‘Yeah, Pope can go out and get anybody,’” Sisk said. “They weren’t really in on (Wilson) too much when Pope first got there … He’s had to work for this, Pope has. To get a guy like that, it would say a lot about for (Pope’s) ability.”
North Carolina head coach Hubert Davis is also in need of a recruiting victory. The fourth-year UNC head coach reached the national championship game in 2022 during his first season leading the Tar Heels, but the results have dipped since. North Carolina missed the NCAA Tournament in 2023. While the Tar Heels won the outright ACC regular-season title last season, they also lost in the Sweet 16 as a 1-seed to Alabama.
UNC began this season ranked No. 9 in the nation but have failed to live up to that billing. The Tar Heels are now 12-8 overall and are ranked outside the top-30 in the KenPom metrics. North Carolina is currently projected as a 10-seed in the NCAA Tournament on Bracket Matrix. On Tuesday night, North Carolina lost at Wake Forest, which followed a home loss for UNC to Stanford.
Carolina’s 2025 recruiting class includes two players: four-star combo guards Derek Dixon and Isaiah Denis. Both players have signed with the Tar Heels.
After Caleb Wilson, what’s next for Kentucky basketball recruiting?
With Wilson set to come off the board with his college commitment, the number of elite basketball prospects in the 2025 recruiting class who are yet to settle on a school continues to dwindle.
Aside from Wilson, only three of the 13 prospects ranked as five-star recruits are yet to commit — power forward Nate Ament (No. 4 overall), power forward Koa Peat (No. 7 overall) and combo guard Brayden Burries (No. 12 overall).
The player to know from this group for Kentucky fans is Ament, a 6-foot-9 power forward from Virginia. Last week, Ament named Kentucky among his top 11 schools. Other programs still being considered by Ament include Alabama, Arkansas, BYU, Duke, Georgetown, Kansas State, Louisville, Notre Dame, Tennessee and Texas.
Ament also would be the logical next option for Pope and the Wildcats to turn to if Wilson commits to North Carolina.
In addition to Ament, the Wildcats also have scholarship offers out to Burries and Peat. Burries is planning a February commitment, but Kentucky isn’t among the schools considered to be in the mix for his pledge. UK has been dropped from consideration by Peat.
Pope and the Wildcats are projected to have plenty of roster spots to fill this offseason.
Seven players from this season’s Kentucky roster will be out of NCAA eligibility at the season’s end. The only current UK scholarship players who will still have eligibility after this season are guards Collin Chandler, Otega Oweh and Travis Perry, forward Trent Noah and center Brandon Garrison. Oweh recently appeared on ESPN’s 2025 NBA draft Big Board, but he was well outside of draft-pick status.
This means Pope and the Wildcats have ample space to target additional class of 2025 recruits — both from the high school and international ranks — as well as transfer portal additions during the offseason.
This story was originally published January 22, 2025 at 6:40 AM.
