Why Alex Wilkins' Commitment Could Change the Kentucky Wildcats' Future Forever

Mark Pope is working overtime to piece together a Kentucky Basketball roster that currently looks alarmingly bare.

With only Zoom Diallo, Reece Potter, Kam Williams, and Trent Noah officially locked in for next season, and Malachi Moreno exploring the draft while Braydon Hawthorne’s status remains unofficial (he told the Herald-Leader he’d be back a month ago, but no announcement from the school), the Wildcats desperately needed a jolt of offensive firepower.

They just got it. Furman standout Alex Wilkins has officially committed to Kentucky, bringing a high-upside scoring punch to a roster that needed it. On3’s Joe Tipton broke the news first.

One of the top mid-major players in college basketball, Wilkins will now likely become part of Kentucky’s revamped starting backcourt next season alongside Diallo.

Alex Wilkins had a national arrival

If you didn’t know the name Alex Wilkins during the regular season, you probably learned it in March. The 6-5 freshman guard put the country on notice by dropping 21 points in Furman’s thrilling upset bid against the UConn Huskies.

While the Paladins ultimately fell short, Wilkins displayed a natural, unteachable scoring ability that immediately made him a high-priority target for power conference programs.

Wilkins is far more than just a volume shooter, though. At 6-foot-5, he has fantastic positional size for a primary ball-handler, and he uses it to generate offense for his teammates. He finished his freshman campaign averaging an impressive 17.8 points and 4.7 assists across 35 games.

In Mark Pope’s system, having a tall guard who can read the floor and facilitate is a big bonus that Kentucky didn’t have last year. Aberdeen led the team in assists, and he was under 4 a game.

The freshman red flags

While the potential to be a star is obvious, there are two glaring holes in Wilkins’ game that need immediate development:

The Shooting: He shot 82.4% from the free-throw line, but struggled from deep, hitting just 32.8% of his three-point attempts. In a system built on spacing, that number has to climb, especially with a lot of other Kentucky targets shooting under 35%.
The Turnovers: This is the scary part. Wilkins averaged a concerning 3.8 turnovers per game. While that is somewhat expected for a high-usage freshman guard, that has to be at least halved. That is a huge jump, but it has to happen.

Landing Wilkins is a massive step in the right direction for a staff that needed to stack wins. He possesses the unteachable offensive ceiling that Kentucky desperately lacked when the offense bogged down last year. Yes, the turnovers are scary, and yes, the jumper needs work.

But if Mark Pope can harness that raw talent and help him mature into a reliable decision-maker, Wilkins has the potential to be an absolute star in Lexington. This is exactly the kind of gamble a rebuilding roster has to take.

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