Before his decision to transfer to Ole Miss, Travis Perry had long been considered one of Kentucky’s most iconic high school basketball players.

“I was devastated when Travis left,” Mark Pope told reporters. “I think he was on his way to becoming a legend here at Kentucky.”

As a junior at Lyon County High School in Eddyville, Kentucky, Perry broke the state’s all-time scoring record, eventually reaching 5,481 career points, a milestone that was just the beginning of his growing legacy.

He capped his historic high school résumé in 2024 by leading Lyon County to a state championship, earning Sweet 16 MVP honors, being named Kentucky’s Mr. Basketball and claiming his second Gatorade Kentucky Player of the Year award, solidifying his place among the greats to come out of the Bluegrass State.

As a freshman for the Wildcats, Perry took on a limited role, primarily serving as a shooter off the bench. Eventually, he decided he wanted something for his game that Kentucky wasn’t offering.

“Whenever I got in the portal, I felt that Coach Beard’s vision for me was exactly what I was looking for,” Perry said in his first media appearance as a Rebel.

Perry emphasized that one of the main reasons for choosing Oxford was the opportunity to grow beyond the label of a pure shooter, something he felt had limited him at Kentucky.

In his lone season as a Wildcat, Perry averaged 2.7 points, 0.8 rebounds and 0.6 assists in 9.8 minutes per game, and despite shooting efficiently, he rarely had plays run for him.

“Travis and I share a vision for his game that he’s much more than a shooter. He’s a guy who can play multiple positions,” Rebels head coach Chris Beard said.

For one of Kentucky’s most accomplished high school players, the move to Oxford is less about leaving home and more about finding the right fit to unlock his full potential.

With a fresh opportunity under Coach Beard, he’s focused on expanding his game, helping the team win and proving he’s more than just a shooter off the bench.

While last year’s team arguably brought life back into Rupp Arena for the first time in a long time, it wasn’t a flawless experience for Mark Pope’s first team.

Among the occasional ailment and plague, easily the most crippling were the injury issues that seemed to constantly plague the team. As a result, Pope was forced to dig to a level of depth on the roster that simply wasn’t quite ready for the roles they were forced to play.

Undoubtedly, every player did the best with the situation they were given — but when you find yourself three/four players down at once, it’s hard for any squad to turn things around.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t try and prevent it. According to Otega Oweh, Kentucky has done exactly that ahead of the 2025-26 season, fostering an extensive roster of talent from top to bottom.

Deeper than the Holler

During a recent stint of media availability following his official return to Lexington, Oweh said of the roster, “I see 14-15 guys that can play.”

“We have multiple guys at each position,” he continued. “I feel like those are the teams that do best in March and throughout the whole season. We have a lot of talent.”

“It’s gonna be really fun.”

With varying talent on every level and expectations slowly rising, this Kentucky team appears to be equipped for everything last season’s unit managed and more. Mark Pope’s complete roster overhaul – comprised of returnees, transfers from competitive schools, and freshman commitments – is built for March.

Transfer players like Denzel Aberdeen, who just won a championship at Florida, and Mohamed Dioubate, who played a crucial role in numerous March Madness runs with Alabama, lend themselves perfectly to the cause. Mixing veterans, those two and Oweh included, in with the team’s wide breadth of younger talent under the roof of one banner-based aspiration should, on the surface, create the perfect storm.

“Fun” looks to be a massive understatement.

It will be a clash of blue bloods at Rupp Arena as Kentucky hosts Hubert Davis and North Carolina in the 2025-26 SEC/ACC Challenge, marking the Tar Heels’ first visit to Lexington since the 2014-15 season.

Kentucky’s nonconference schedule already featured several marquee matchups, and now adds even more firepower with one of the sport’s premier programs heading to Rupp Arena.

Jon Rothstein of CBS Sports was first to report the matchups Wednesday afternoon, listing the full slate of SEC/ACC Challenge games:

2025 SEC/ACC Challenge Games

• North Carolina at Kentucky
• Florida at Duke
• Virginia at Texas
• NC State at Auburn
• Clemson at Alabama
• Louisville at Arkansas
• Oklahoma at Wake Forest
• SMU at Vanderbilt
• Texas A&M at Pitt
• Mississippi State at Georgia Tech
• Miami at Ole Miss
• LSU at Boston College
• Virginia Tech at South Carolina
• Tennessee at Syracuse
• Missouri at Notre Dame
• Georgia at Florida State

Kentucky traveled to Clemson for last season’s challenge, falling to the Tigers 70-66.