Kentucky basketball rolls to one last win in Rupp Arena. Cats blow out LSU on Senior Night
The Kentucky basketball seniors left Rupp Arena with one last victory Tuesday night. Mark Pope’s No. 19-ranked Wildcats — playing their final home game in his first season as head coach — dominated LSU from the beginning and departed their home court for the last time with a 95-64 win over the Tigers.
Seniors Lamont Butler, Koby Brea, Andrew Carr and Amari Williams were joined in the UK starting lineup by Otega Oweh — a junior guard who could return for next season — and Ansley Almonor came off the bench early in the first half. By the time Almonor drained a 3-pointer to give Kentucky a 21-10 lead with 10:06 to go in the first half, every one of those seniors had scored. LSU (14-16, 3-14 SEC) actually scored the first two points of the game, but it took the Tigers a while to tally another one after that. Kentucky (20-10, 9-8 SEC) went on a 15-0 run after that opening bucket from LSU, capping the flurry with a fast-break dunk from Butler. That began with a 3-pointer from Brea and also included a 3 by Carr and an old-fashioned 3-point play from Williams. Almonor’s 3-pointer around the midway point of the half kicked off a 12-0 run by the Wildcats, who ended that one with a 30-10 lead. UK went into halftime with a 50-23 advantage, the Cats’ largest of the season. Kentucky’s lead ballooned to 33 points before the first TV timeout of the second half, and the Wildcats ended up with their largest margin of victory in SEC play this season.
Oweh led Kentucky with 24 points, with 15 of those coming in the first half. He scored only four points in the Wildcats’ 94-78 loss to No. 1 Auburn in Rupp Arena on Saturday afternoon. He’s now scored in double figures in 28 of 30 games this season.
Sophomore forward Brandon Garrison was also in double figures with 15 points, and freshman guard Collin Chandler had 11 points and went 3-for-6 from 3-point range. Among the seniors, Almonor was the leading scorer with a season-high 15 points. Brea scored six points. Butler had five points, five rebounds and five assists. Carr finished with eight points and six rebounds. And Williams tallied nine points and six rebounds. The pregame Senior Night ceremony featured those five players and Jaxson Robinson, who will miss the rest of this season with a right wrist injury. Robinson is scheduled to fly to New York for surgery on his wrist later this week.
Not taking part in the Tuesday night festivities was backup point guard Kerr Kriisa, who will be eligible for another season of college basketball beyond this one after injuring his foot on Dec. 7.
Pope confirmed on his weekly radio show Monday night that Kriisa would not be part of UK’s Senior Night, since he has the option to return for another season of college. The Kentucky coach implied that Kriisa would not return to the court this season, though he did not explicitly say that he would be back with the Wildcats for the 2025-26 campaign. Next up for Kentucky is a trip to Missouri for the final game of the regular season, a matchup with the No. 15 Tigers at noon EST Saturday on ESPN. Missouri (21-8, 10-6 SEC) was 0-18 in the league last season but came into this week with a chance to nab one of the double-byes in the upcoming SEC Tournament, which will be played next week in Nashville. The Tigers were projected as a 5 seed for the NCAA Tournament in the ESPN Bracketology update Tuesday morning. Kentucky was a 3 seed in those projections. Free UK basketball newsletter The Herald-Leader launched a free Kentucky men’s basketball newsletter — Beyond the Arc — at the beginning of the 2024-25 season. The newsletter features links to the latest stories on Mark Pope’s team, as well as inside information, analysis and other news tidbits related to the Wildcats.