Another top basketball recruit is off the board. His choice wasn’t Kentucky
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Class of 2026 college basketball recruit Caleb Holt commits to Arizona.
- Holt is a five-star shooting guard who is considered one of the top players in his class.
- Holt’s college finalists were Alabama, Arizona, Houston, Kentucky and Providence.
Another highly-touted Kentucky basketball recruit is off the board in the 2026 recruiting cycle.
Five-star shooting guard Caleb Holt committed to Arizona on Tuesday morning. Holt made his college choice on national TV during an episode of ESPN’s “First Take.”
Holt chose Arizona from a list of finalists that also included Alabama, Houston, Kentucky and Providence. He narrowed his recruitment to those five schools in December.
Holt is ranked by the 247Sports Composite as the No. 4 overall prospect in the 2026 recruiting class. The 6-foot-5 recruit is from Alabama, but he’s playing his final season of high school basketball at Prolific Prep in Florida.
Mark Pope’s UK program wasn’t considered to be in the mix for Holt leading up to Tuesday’s decision.
UK hosted Holt for an official visit in September, and Holt made a return trip to Lexington in October on an unofficial visit for Big Blue Madness. In addition to these visits, Pope worked with Holt last summer during a USA Basketball training camp in Colorado.
That training camp was used to determine the U.S. roster for the 2025 FIBA Under-19 World Cup in Switzerland, an event the Americans won. Arizona’s Tommy Lloyd was the head coach of that U.S. squad.
Holt is Arizona’s second commitment of the 2026 recruiting cycle, joining four-star small forward Cameron Holmes.
Several other connections exist between Holt and the UK program. Holt has represented the United States at international basketball events alongside UK sophomore forward Jayden Quaintance and freshman guard Jasper Johnson.
Assistant coach Jason Hart was UK’s lead recruiter for Holt.
“Beyond any individual basketball skill, his intangibles — determination, grit and leadership — help him consistently impact winning basketball,” Zach Welch, an analyst for Pro Insight Basketball, told the Herald-Leader in a message about Holt. “Beyond this, (Holt) is a fearsome defender, both with the capability to blow plays up off the ball and some upside as a versatile on-ball defender.”
UK remains one of only two SEC schools, along with Georgia, yet to land a commitment from the high school senior class. Dating back to at least 2010, this is the latest Kentucky has gone in a recruiting cycle without a commitment from a high school prospect.
With Holt now off the board, there are only a handful of recruits left in the 2026 class with a UK scholarship offer.
Among those are top-ranked prospect Tyran Stokes and five-star power forward Christian Collins. At one time, Pope and the Cats were viewed as the favorite to land both players, before each of their recruitments took a turn.
Recent reporting from 247Sports’ Travis Branham indicates Kentucky may have regained some footing in its recruitment of Stokes, a small forward who just won a high school state championship in Washington.
This story was originally published March 10, 2026 at 12:07 PM.
