UK men’s basketball recruiting: New developments with Kentucky’s class of 2025 prospects

As teenage boys are wont to do, Taylen Kinney tried his hardest to mess with his friend.

Shortly after the conclusion of last week’s Overtime Elite (OTE) fall combine at the OTE Arena in Atlanta’s Atlantic Station neighborhood, a selection of elite young basketball players were whisked away to an interview room.

After showcasing their skills in front of around 90 college coaches and NBA scouts, you couldn’t blame a few teenagers for wanting to blow off some steam.

So there was Kinney — an emerging class of 2026 point guard who previously starred at Newport High School in Northern Kentucky — doing his best to disrupt an interview conducted by class of 2025 Kentucky commit Jasper Johnson, another standout guard who is also a commonwealth native.

As Johnson spoke with a national recruiting reporter and detailed the reasons why he committed to Mark Pope’s Kentucky program last month, Kinney — during an interview with the Herald-Leader — feverishly did arm movements that mimicked the “UK” logo, trying his best to distract the future Wildcat seated near him.

“Every day, every time we’re talking or something, (Johnson tells me) about UK,” Kinney said.

The gesture was a clear indication of the good vibes between Johnson and Kinney, who will play on the same team at OTE this season.

“Yeah, that’s my guy,” Kinney said of Johnson. “Off the court we have a good relationship. He’s really cool. On the court, he’s just a killer. I’m happy we’re on the same team.”

Johnson, obviously, is trying his best to get Kinney to come to Lexington. Should that come to fruition, it would extend UK’s already strong recent run of securing commitments from the commonwealth’s best basketball players.

But that’s a talking point to worry about in a year’s time, when Kinney and other class of 2026 standouts begin to seriously assess their college options.

For now, the focus is on Johnson, fellow Kentucky native and class of 2025 UK commit center Malachi Moreno and other 2025 prospects whose recruitments are starting to take shape.

After a week of activity, here’s a fresh look at UK basketball’s big board for the highly regarded 2025 recruiting group.

Kentucky basketball still in contention for several five-star recruits

Kentucky basketball’s 2025 recruiting class is currently comprised of both Johnson and Moreno, a pair of five-star prospects who both rank among the top 25 players in the class, per the 247Sports Composite. Johnson is ranked by that service as the No. 14 overall player in the class. Moreno, recently elevated to five-star status, checks in as the No. 24 prospect.

UK is the only school — according to the 247Sports Composite rankings — with two commits inside the top 70 of the rankings.

Pope, UK’s first-year head coach, is doing his best to add to this already-encouraging recruiting haul.

There are seven prospects in the 2025 class with Kentucky scholarship offers that UK fans should still be monitoring as the fall official visit season continues.

In the backcourt, UK is still involved with point guard Mikel Brown Jr. and combo guards Brayden Burries and Acaden Lewis.

Brown, a 6-foot-3 guard, completed an official visit to UK over the weekend. Brown picked up a UK scholarship offer in June and has already taken official recruiting trips to Alabama, Ole Miss, Central Florida and Indiana. Later this fall, Brown — who is ranked by the 247Sports Composite as the second-best point guard in the 2025 class — has visits planned to Maryland and Arizona.

Brown’s father played college basketball at South Carolina Aiken and West Florida, and Brown’s mother was a collegiate volleyball player.

Burries, a 6-4 guard from California, has only taken one official visit thus far, to Arizona in February. Kentucky jumped into Burries’ recruitment somewhat recently, having offered a scholarship to the complete playmaker in July following the end of the Nike grassroots season. New UK assistant coach Jason Hart, who holds extensive ties to the state of California, has been heading up this recruitment.

Lewis, a 6-foot-2 guard from Washington D.C., is a player who UK should be increasingly bullish about landing. Lewis officially has a top-three list that includes a trio of blue blood programs: Duke, Kentucky and two-time defending national champion UConn. Lewis recently dropped North Carolina from consideration.

Lewis will officially visit Duke this weekend for the Blue Devils’ annual Countdown to Craziness event. The date for Lewis’ official visit to UK is expected to be announced soon, which means the Wildcats will get the final visit in his recruitment.

UConn — which Lewis officially visited last month — just picked up a commitment from class of 2025 five-star shooting guard Darius Adams.

“He’s just a great guy. Really genuine, and he’s preaching that I can come in and play right away,” Lewis told the Herald-Leader about Pope, UK’s new coach, in July. “That’s something, obviously, everybody wants to hear going to the next level. But I really believed it, it seemed genuine.”

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In the frontcourt, UK is still involved with power forwards Nate Ament, Caleb Wilson and Niko Bundalo, as well as center Chris Cenac.

Ament, a 6-9 prospect, was supposed to visit Kentucky in late August, before that trip to Lexington was postponed. Ament took an official visit to Texas last weekend, and it appears he intends to take his recruitment slow. He also has official visits set up to Tennessee and Kansas State.

Wilson, another 6-9 prospect, was one of the first blockbuster recruits Pope hosted for an official visit at UK. That trip to Lexington came last month, and by all accounts it went well for the Wildcats. Wilson was formerly recruited to UK by former coach John Calipari, and while it took Pope a while to ramp up his pursuit of Wilson, the Georgia native has emerged as perhaps UK’s top recruiting target left on the board.

Wilson has upcoming trips set for Alabama and hometown Georgia Tech, while also still being interested in visiting a slew of other programs, including Arkansas, BYU, North Carolina and Tennessee.

“It was a really good visit. I had a lot of fun. I was able to really build a good relationship with coach Pope and the rest of the staff and I feel like they really embraced me as a fan base and with the team,” Wilson told 247Sports of his UK visit. “Their offense was really nice. I like their players, the court and the team is really together.”

Bundalo, a 6-10 recruit, is officially down to nine schools in his recruitment. That list includes Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan State, North Carolina, Ohio State, Pittsburgh, Texas, Xavier and UConn. In the summer, it sounded like an October visit to Kentucky was likely for Bundalo, but that trip hasn’t materialized. He’s already visited Michigan State, Ohio State and UConn.

Lastly there’s Cenac, a 6-10 prospect whose recruitment exploded this summer. Cenac was on campus last weekend with Brown as both players took an official visit to Kentucky.

Cenac is still operating with a lengthy top-12 list of schools that includes Alabama, Arkansas, Auburn, Baylor, Houston, Kentucky, LSU, Louisville, Michigan State, Tennessee, Texas and UConn. Cenac has visited Auburn, Houston, Kentucky and Tennessee, and he will visit LSU in November. While Kentucky already has a center secured in the 2025 recruiting class with Moreno, the Great Crossing High School standout is viewed as more of a long-term prospect, and Cenac’s versatility is likelier to have a more immediate impact at the college level.

It remains to be seen just how big Pope’s first true recruiting class at Kentucky will be, but it’s clear that he can take as many first-year players as he wishes.

Seven players on the 2024-25 Kentucky basketball roster will be out of NCAA eligibility after this season. The 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.

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