Kentucky won big in its brief trip to Canada this past week while participating in the GLOBL JAM, where it returned home with the gold medal after winning all four games and gained valuable experience for an overhauled roster (while apparently hanging out at Drake’s crib in the process).
But it wasn’t all big wins for Big Blue up north, as its frontcourt depth — already a concern with five-star freshman Aaron Bradshaw undergoing surgery earlier this summer to address a fractured foot — took a bigger hit with second-year breakout candidate Ugonna Onyenso sustaining a foot injury during practices leading up to the tournament.
UK coach John Calipari over the weekend hinted that Onyenso’s injury, at first not seen as severe, was potentially more significant than initially feared and that he could be out “a while.”
Those fears were formally confirmed Tuesday, as Calipari tweeted that Onyenso will be out for “a couple of months.”
“Nobody hated missing last week’s games more than him and I know he’s going to work his way back to once again have a positive impact on this team,” Calipari tweeted.
So where do the ‘Cats prowl from here as their rotation of bigs — once seen as a potential strength even as it looks to replace a former national player of the year in Oscar Tshiebwe — suddenly looks questionable at best and downright dicey at worst?
Here’s how things could shake out, where things stand and an overview of the pedigree both incoming and already in-house:
Onyenso’s bona fides
In Kentucky’s sixth-ranked recruiting class in 2022, Onyenso was an under-the-radar piece who ranked as the third-highest ranked prospect of four high school commits and a four-star talent, the result of reclassifying from the 2023 class to the 2022 class somewhat late in the cycle. At 7-feet tall and pushing 240 pounds, he sparsely saw playing time last season, appearing in 16 games and averaging 2.5…
..
