The Kentucky men’s basketball team will host a second marquee opponent in exhibition action when the Georgetown Hoyas visit Rupp Arena at Central Bank Center on Oct. 30 as a part of the 2025-26 schedule.
A game time and television designation will be announced at a later date.
Newly adopted NCAA rules permitting Division I programs to play in the preseason enabled the teams to add this early-season marquee contest to their schedules. The game will not count towards official records or statistics. Kentucky is also welcoming Purdue in an exhibition contest at home on Oct. 24.
Georgetown is led by Ed Cooley who is in his third year at the helm of the program. The Hoyas went 9-23 in his first season and improved to 18-16 in year two. Junior Malik Mack who started all 32 games in which he appeared a season ago, is the Hoyas’ leading returning scorer at 12.9 points per game. He also drained a team-high 59 3-pointers and connected at a 35.5% rate.
Pope and the Wildcats are coming off the program’s first Sweet 16 appearance since 2019 and return Collin Chandler, Brandon Garrison and Trent Noah who all contributed to a 24-12 season which featured wins over an NCAA-record-tying eight Associated Press Top 15 foes. Chandler shot 12 for 23 (52.2%) from distance over his final six games – all against NCAA Tournament teams. Garrison produced seven double-figure scoring efforts and shot 50.9% from the field in 17.3 minutes per game as a sophomore, while Noah’s breakthrough performance came in an 11-point effort in an upset of No. 5 Tennessee at home.
Adding to UK’s firepower in 2025-26 is one of the highest-ranked transfer classes in the country. The Cats will add 2025 National Champion Denzel Aberdeen from Florida, a two-time NCAA Sweet 16 participant in Alabama’s Mouhamed Dioubate, an All-Atlantic Coast Conference performer in Pitt’s Jaland Lowe, Reece Potter from Miami of Ohio who is a Lexington native and a part of the RedHawks who won 25 games in 2024-25, National Defensive Player of the Year late season finalist Jayden Quaintance from Arizona State and Kam Williams from Tulane who earned American Athletic Conference All-Freshman Team honors.
Aberdeen logged 7.7 points, 1.7 rebounds and 1.4 assists per game while shooting 41.8% from the field, 35.0% from distance and 70.8% from the free-throw line in 2024-25. In his five starts this season, he averaged 14.4 points and shot 41.4% from 3-point range (12 for 29). Dioubate averaged 7.2 points, 5.9 rebounds and 1.1 assists per game for the Crimson Tide in 2024-25. He scored double-figures in 13 outings and had five double-doubles. Lowe started all 31 games for Pitt and averaged a team-high 16.8 points per game to couple with 5.5 assists, 4.2 rebounds and 1.8 steals per game. Potter averaged 6.3 points and 3.4 rebounds in 15.7 minutes per contest in two seasons at Miami. He shot 45.4 percent from the field and an impressive 39.8 percent from 3-point range. Quaintance started all 24 games in which he played with the Sun Devils, averaging 9.4 points, 7.9 rebounds, 2.6 blocks and 1.5 assists while shooting 52.5 percent from the field. Williams averaged 9.3 points, 4.5 rebounds, 1.3 assists and 1.4 blocks per game, while shooting 41.2% from distance in his lone season with the Green Wave.
The Cats also three have first-year player signees in Andrija Jelavić, Jasper Johnson and Malachi Moreno. Johnson and Moreno were both members of Team USA at the Nike Hoop Summit in April. Johnson averaged 20.3 points, 5.9 rebounds and 5.8 assists per game for Real Wild Energy in the Overtime Elite League. Moreno was named Mr. Kentucky Basketball after leading Great Crossing High School to its first state title in program history where he tallied 24 points, 15 rebounds and five blocks in the championship victory. He was also a McDonald’s All-American selection. Jelavić is one of the top European prospects who has averaged 11.0 points, 7.4 rebounds, 1.5 assists and 1.0 steals per game for Mega Superbet in the Adriatic League.
Those interested in new season tickets are encouraged to enter the season-ticket lottery. Due to the extremely high renewal rate of men’s basketball season tickets, only a limited number of upper-level tickets are available each year through the lottery.
A limited number of new lower-level season tickets are available with a capital pledge commitment, as are memberships in Rupp Arena’s newest hospitality space, the Champions Club. For more information on premium options, please contact the K Fund Office at (859) 257-6300.
For the latest on the Kentucky men’s basketball team, follow @KentuckyMBB on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, and on the web at UKathletics.com.
