{"id":490297,"date":"2025-12-23T05:16:53","date_gmt":"2025-12-23T05:16:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/490297\/"},"modified":"2025-12-23T05:16:53","modified_gmt":"2025-12-23T05:16:53","slug":"mark-pope-does-not-expect-to-add-pg-for-jaland-lowe-insurance-not-sure-were-shopping","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/490297\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Pope does not expect to add PG for Jaland Lowe insurance: ‘Not sure we’re shopping.’"},"content":{"rendered":"

As speculation grows that Kentucky <\/a>may be in the market for a mid-year point guard addition with Jaland Lowe<\/a> fighting through a shoulder injury that could impact his long-term availability, Mark Pope <\/a>decided to pour some cold water on the possibility going into the Wildcats\u2019 matchup vs. Bellarmine.<\/p>\n

Lowe insurance? The second-year head coach doesn\u2019t think that will be necessary for a couple of reasons, the biggest being that he expects the Pittsburgh transfer to stay healthy the rest of the way.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have every expectation Jaland is going to be with us the whole season, and we\u2019re excited about it,\u201d Pope said.<\/p>\n

Should something happen to Lowe to affect his availability, Pope is confident there are enough pieces elsewhere on the roster to keep the Wildcats from drowning, specifically mentioning Denzel Aberdeen<\/a> and Jasper Johnson <\/a>as more than capable replacements.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a great roster. I\u2019m not sure we\u2019re shopping a lot right now,\u201d Pope said of a mid-year addition. <\/a>\u201cWe have an unbelievable amount of faith in our guys, first of all, with Jaland. Jasper is going to grow into a starring role. He\u2019s been so good. D.A. is becoming more and more and more comfortable becoming a full-time point, but also being on the move at the two. <\/p>\n

\u201cI love our roster right now, and we\u2019re excited about this group. I think we have an incredible, incredible run ahead of us. That\u2019s what we\u2019re thinking about with this roster right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lowe was on the court for seven seconds in the first half vs. St. John\u2019s before reaggravating his injured right shoulder \u2014 a third incident for the junior point guard since October. His season flashed before Big Blue Nation\u2019s eyes, only for him to run back out there for warmups after halftime and play 15 second-half minutes, finishing with 13 points on 5-7 shooting with three assists and three rebounds.<\/p>\n

Like you, Pope was shocked to see him take the floor again, but was certainly grateful for the speedy recovery. Without him, the Wildcats likely don\u2019t beat the Red Storm.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m surprised. As we finished our halftime meeting with the team, (trainer) Brandon Wells grabbed me and said, \u2018Hey, I think he\u2019s good. I think he\u2019s okay to go.\u2019 He was working a lot on adrenaline, for sure. You talk about another player who is just dying to be on the court and compete with the guys. With some trepidation, he was like, \u2018No, I feel good, I feel strong. I feel okay.\u2019 <\/p>\n

\u201cAnd certainly, he played elite-level basketball. It was the best showing that he\u2019s had for us by far.\u201d<\/p>\n

As long as Lowe stays healthy, fans would be just fine riding that wave the rest of the season. Is it possible? Pope clearly thinks so.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll see what happens against Bellarmine, followed by the start of SEC play in January. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s pretty sore today. We\u2019ll see how it is tomorrow,\u201d the second-year head coach continued. \u201cWe\u2019ll continue to proceed with caution with these guys. He\u2019s bounced back really fast, so I know he\u2019s got great basketball in him.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As speculation grows that Kentucky may be in the market for a mid-year point guard addition with Jaland…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":490298,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3724],"tags":[7,14352,1466,4452],"class_list":{"0":"post-490297","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-denzel-aberdeen-22-dr-phillips","10":"tag-jaland-lowe-23-fort-bend-marshall","11":"tag-jasper-johnson-25-overtime-elite"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115767190736348786","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490297","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=490297"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/490297\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/490298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=490297"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=490297"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=490297"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}