One player sums up this UK basketball team’s sacrifice. And it’s been a long time coming.

Whenever Kentucky and Duke get together, it’s a game to circle on the calendar, not only for fans of those two teams, but for anyone who enjoys college basketball.

For Ansley Almonor, the latest edition of UK-Duke wasn’t simply something that he’s been looking forward to since the 2024-25 schedule came out. It’s the realization of a childhood dream, something that’s been quite literally staring him in the face since he was a kid.

Growing up in Spring Valley, New York — just a few miles from the New Jersey border — Almonor loved basketball. His father, who, like his mother is originally from Haiti, played the sport. His older brother played it, too.

As a kid, Almonor’s dream was to play it at the highest level. Somewhere along the way — sixth or seventh grade, he can’t remember exactly when — someone told Almonor that he should put his goals on his bedroom wall, so it would be the first thing he’d see when he woke up every morning.

And so he did. The goals came in the form of two posters. One featured a UK logo. The other one, a Duke logo.

“So every day I woke up, I would see it,” Almonor said. “Because that’s where I wanted to be. That’s where I wanted to end up. Because I knew, once you end up there, you’re closer to your goal, which is the NBA.”

A decade after he put up those posters, Almonor reflected on that ambitious dream of a middle schooler — unlikely to be fulfilled right up until the moment it was — as he sat in the UK basketball practice facility and looked forward to playing against the Blue Devils while wearing a Wildcats uniform.

“I woke up every day and saw it,” he said with a smile. “And now I’m here. It’s crazy how life works.”

No options as a recruit

Almonor’s boyhood dream — to play for one of college basketball’s blue bloods — wasn’t any different from countless other kids who get hung up on hoops at a young age. Obviously, few actually make it. And for the longest time, Almonor seemed destined to be one of the dreamers who wouldn’t.

He was a good player for his New Jersey high school, but he wasn’t good enough to get any Division I offers. So Almonor opted for a year of prep school instead. That season ended up being the one impacted by COVID-19, and the NCAA’s decision to extend an extra year of eligibility to anyone in college at the time led to a more difficult landscape for younger prospects in Almonor’s situation.

With so many veteran college players sticking around for a fifth season, there wasn’t nearly as much demand for teenage recruits, and coaches weren’t permitted to scout in person, so it was tough for Almonor to get looks.

Fairleigh Dickinson was the first school to send him a scholarship offer, and he jumped at it.

As a freshman, Almonor didn’t play much, averaging 3.5 points in 9.7 minutes per game. That offseason, FDU went through a coaching change, and the vibes from the new staff — led by head coach Tobin Anderson — indicated the 6-foot-7 forward wouldn’t play much as a sophomore either.

Rather than jump ship, he got in the gym.

“I just went back home and worked my tail off,” Almonor said. “I worked the hardest I’ve ever worked — just so I could prove him wrong, prove that I could play in his system, prove that I could be a successful player at this level. And I came back, and he saw that I was a different player and that he could definitely use me. And then it just changed how he looked at me.

“And obviously, I had a great year that year and just continued the cycle.”

Almonor said he was in the gym four or five times a day that offseason, putting up shots, improving his skills and transforming his body to get in much better shape.

As a sophomore, Almonor started 34 of 36 games. He was third on the team in scoring at 13.6 points per game and grabbed more rebounds than anyone on the roster. After shooting only 35 total 3-pointers in his first season, Almonor went 75-for-197 (38.1%) from deep in his second, thriving in Anderson’s system.

But the real highlight of that season had nothing to do with his personal growth.

FDU made the NCAA Tournament as a 16 seed that year, defeated Texas Southern in one of the “First Four” games and then pulled off a shocker two days later, defeating Purdue to become just the second 16 to knock off a 1 seed in the history of March Madness.

Following the Cinderella run, Anderson was hired as Rick Pitino’s replacement at Iona, and FDU promoted Jack Castleberry to the top job, meaning Almonor was about to get his third head coach in three college seasons.

Once again, he excelled, leading FDU in scoring at 16.4 points per game, playing more minutes than anyone on the team and getting even more looks from deep — going 93-for-236 (39.4%) on 3-pointers. He became a 1,000-point scorer toward the end of the season, and after it was over, he started looking for a bigger challenge.

From FDU to Kentucky

Almonor laughs now at the fact that he played for three coaches over his first three years of college.

“You know, it’s funny when I think back on it, it’s like, ‘I really had three coaches in three years.’ Like, every year was a different type of attitude, a different temperament,” he said. “It’s just something that you have to get used to. You gotta get used to it, and you gotta get used to it quick. For you to be successful, you obviously have to be close with your coach, understand your coach. So it was a challenge.

“But I enjoyed my time there and appreciate all three of the coaches.”

So why not stay put and enjoy the continuity for his final season of college? Almonor said he felt like he adjusted “perfectly fine” to each change, giving him confidence that he could find success playing for a fourth head coach.

And he still had those lofty dreams that had been pinned to his bedroom wall since middle school.

“I wanted to go do something big, go do something special,” he said. “So I might as well just go make the jump and see where it takes me.”

For most of his time in the transfer portal, it didn’t look like the jump would send Almonor that much higher up the college basketball ladder. It was getting late in the spring, and roster spots at the biggest schools were filling up.

Almonor was on the verge of committing to Siena for the 2024-25 season. He was still hearing from a handful of high-major programs, including some in the SEC, but the fits didn’t seem right.

“And there wasn’t a Kentucky calling me,” he explained, a tone of reverence in his voice as he said the name of the school. “So that call from Kentucky really just changed my whole world.”

When it came time to talk to Mark Pope, it wasn’t just a phone call. As is his wont, Pope’s first communication with Almonor came via FaceTime. The Kentucky coach has said he likes his calls to be more personal and that — if he can’t actually talk in person — he prefers to see whoever he’s talking to on video.

It allows Pope to get a feel for the players he’s recruiting. It also gives the players a better sense for the coach, a method that has proven valuable in his first few months on the job.

“You could just tell off that first FaceTime call what type of person he was, how his energy is. And, you know, it just drew me to him more,” Almonor said, adding that he couldn’t remember having any other video calls with college coaches. “It definitely was a great first impression.”

Not long after that, it was official. Almonor was actually (finally) going to be a Wildcat.

“It’s a lifelong goal, a lifelong dream. So it’s just a surreal feeling,” he said. “It was crazy, especially at that point in the portal — I was close to making a decision. And that (call) coming in, I felt like God had a plan for me, and He put that right there for me, and He did his magic. So it was just crazy to have that opportunity come right in front of my face.”

What Pope sees in Almonor

It would have been understandable for Almonor to say no to the Wildcats.

He could’ve gone to Siena — or somewhere similar — and continued on as a big fish in the mid-major end of the college basketball pool.

By that point, Kentucky’s roster was basically full. Almonor’s commitment came more than two weeks after the flurry that saw Lamont Butler, Otega Oweh, Andrew Carr, Brandon Garrison, Koby Brea and Kerr Kriisa pledge to the program in a matter of days.

When Almonor signed with UK on May 17, the 2024-25 roster was already complete, except for Jaxson Robinson, but it was correctly assumed in Kentucky basketball circles that Pope’s leading scorer at BYU would eventually drop out of the NBA draft and pick the Wildcats.

So, Almonor wasn’t recruited over. He knew exactly what he was getting into: no guarantees and a fight for playing time. He picked Kentucky anyway.

“It was a selling point,” he said. “Coach said he wanted to win a national championship, and he needed the best roster possible to do that. And he thought that picking me up and adding me to his roster would help that. And, obviously, me going against who I go against in practice every day was going to help me tremendously. That’s not something you could get somewhere else. So I just thought it was a win-win situation.”

To add a player of Almonor’s caliber at that late stage was a coup for Kentucky, but Pope figured then and knows now that he was getting more than just a solid piece to round out his roster.

In an interview with the Herald-Leader, the UK coach’s face brightened at the mention of Almonor’s name. After relaxing on a couch in his office for much of the conversation, Pope sat up a little straighter while talking about the transfer from FDU.

“I love self-aware people,” Pope began. “Self-aware people are super powerful people because they actually use their power instead of trying to find something else. They’re actually the most powerful, effective people, and they’re great teammates. Unbelievable teammates. He’s very self-aware, and he’s incredibly intelligent. He’s one of the brightest guys in our organization.

“I also like fearless guys, and he’s fearless. He had a super-defined role. He’d been the leader of his team and a leader in the league for a long time. And he made a jump that a lot of people didn’t prognosticate out and said, ‘No, I want to go see.’ I can relate to that. As a transfer myself, I had a lot of opportunities that would have been more secure. But I was like, ‘No, I want to go to Kentucky, because I want to go see if I can do it. I want to go see if I can compete with those guys in practice every day. And can I be an important part of what happens? Can I actually have the chops to do it?’”

Pope continued, explaining that for a player like Almonor to join a 12-deep roster like this one meant there would be “nowhere to hide” for his final season of college: “When you jump in the fray, you can’t hide. You can’t hide in practice. You can’t hide in meetings. You can’t hide in games. Can’t hide anywhere. And I love the fact that he’s fearless like that. I love it.

“And then the third thing I love about this kid is he understands that when you become a part of something bigger than yourself, it actually is really elevating. And I don’t know if he would use exactly those words, but he also is like, ‘I want to come take a massive swing. I want to go test myself, and I want to go be a part of something that’s bigger than just me.’ And all three of those qualities, man, those should be defining features of Kentucky basketball players.”

Pope closed his thoughts on Almonor by leaning forward and making a prediction.

“I’m telling you, at some point in the year, this dude’s gonna win us games. I’m telling you. And he is just a beautiful person. He’s making a massive difference in everything about our program.”

The path to playing time

On a team filled with players seemingly willing to sacrifice personal accolades to be part of something bigger, arguably no one embodies that spirit more than Almonor.

No one on this roster scored more points than he did last season. No one took more shots. He made 65 starts over the past two years, but it was assumed when Almonor committed to the Cats that he was unlikely to be in Pope’s first five. He knew before he got here that he would have to earn every minute.

Pope is playing a 10-man rotation for the time being. Of those 10 players, Almonor played the least of anyone — 13 minutes off the bench — in the season-opening, 41-point win over Wright State last week. He was also one of the most exuberant in the postgame celebrations.

“I wanted to be a part of something that was bigger than me,” he said. “It wasn’t really about my individual accolades or, like, what I could get, or anything individually. I wanted to be a part of a team that could go win the national championship. I wanted to be a part of a team that can really do something special when it comes to March. So that’s why I wanted to make that sacrifice.”

None of this means that Almonor checked his personal ambitions at the Wildcat Lodge doors. He wants to leave Lexington as a better player than when he arrived.

Since he started working out with the Wildcats, the already accomplished 3-point shooter has paid special attention to improving as a defender — specifically, as one who can guard multiple positions on the perimeter — and a rebounder, two areas that would surely help him get more time on the court. He’s still in the process of getting in better condition for Pope’s fast style of play, noting that he’s made gains there over the past few months.

“I’ve gotten so much better since I got here in June,” he said. “I can’t wait to see what we’re all gonna be in April. It’s just been a great, great time so far.”

Almonor also wants to prove something to those doubting that he can make a meaningful impact at a place like Kentucky after spending the past three seasons at the mid-major level. He acknowledged the speed of the game, as well as the size and strength of the players, are all different now, but it’s something he feels like he got adjusted to while battling his teammates over the summer.

“I feel like I can play at this level. I know I can play at this level. It’s not something that I’m worried about or anything. It’s just hearing other people be worried and hearing other people say certain things about me, when they really don’t know me — or they haven’t really seen me play — it’s kind of annoying.

“So I just want to go out there and just show them that, like, you’re really wrong,” he continued with a chuckle. “Like, you don’t know as much as you think you do.”

Almonor is embracing the challenge while also being realistic about his role. He’s not going to put up 408 shots as a Wildcat — like he did last season at FDU — and it would be a shock if he led Kentucky in scoring.

But he didn’t come here to be a star. He came to play his part, and he’s grateful that Pope has given him the opportunity to close out his college career at a place he’s always dreamed of playing.

“He’s been great. I can’t complain at all. He’s such a great coach. Just a great person,” Almonor said. “His energy is second to none. I love playing for him every day — he teaches me so much. And I just can’t wait to go out there and actually fight for him. And, you know, back up what he’s saying about us. He’s telling the world that our goal is to go win number nine. And I can’t wait to go out there and do what I can do to make sure we win number nine.”

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