The Wildcats have added ten new players to the roster.
Mark Pope is only two months into his employment at Kentucky, but he’s already demonstrated that his limited success as a college basketball head coach was due to limits imposed by Utah Valley and BYU. Pope is expanding his roster now that he has access to outstanding talent in Lexington.
While Pope was unable to keep a single player from John Calipari’s roster, he did add ten players to his 2024 roster. Seven came through the transfer portal, with three more coming in as incoming freshman, including Collin Chandler, who spent the last two years on a mission trip after committing to Pope and BYU in 2022.
Coach Cal was the king of the one-and-done, but Pope has redefined that term, one Big Blue Nation was tired of hearing. Pope’s one-and-done players are graduate transfers like Kerr Kriisa from West Virginia, Koby Brea from Dayton, LaMont Butler from San Diego State, Andrew Carr from Wake Forest, and Amari Williams from Drexel.
While the roster is loaded with quality contributors, it’s still missing a real centerpiece, but Pope doesn’t appear to be done. It may not look like this come Game 1 next season, but here is Kentucky’s tentative projected starting five.
At this point, Kriisa is well-traveled. He began his career at Arizona before transferring to West Virginia, a move likely made for the Wildcats to clear room for Caleb Love in Tuscon. Now, with Darian DeVries taking over in Morgantown Kriisa needed a new home for his final year of college basketball.
