Kentucky has yet to land a commit in the 2026 class, but the Wildcats are in the mix for one of the top recruits in the country, five-star wing Anthony Thompson. The 6-foot-7, 185-pound Hudson, Ohio, native is the eighth-ranked player in the country according to 247Sports Composite Rankings.
Thompson has scheduled his official visits for the fall, and they include trips to major national powerhouses before culminating in Lexington on September 24.
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Anthony Thompson could be Kentucky’s first 5-star recruit of the Mark Pope era
Mark Pope is a different coach from John Calipari. That’s one of the main reasons he was hired at be his replacement at Kentucky, and why he broke the Wildcats' Sweet 16 drought in Year 1. However, it’s not like Coach Cal has faded into the wilderness.
Cal led Arkansas to the Sweet 16, and even in a changing landscape, the 2012 National Champions’ roster construction philosophies haven’t quite gone the way of the dodo. Cal attracted a top 10 recruiting class with multiple five-stars to Fayetteville in the 2025 cycle and already has a top-15 commit in the 2026 class.
Pope is not the recruiter that Calipari was or is. While his inaugural high school class at Kentucky ranked inside the national top 15, he leans heavily on the transfer portal to acquire talent. That’s proven to be a viable strategy to compete for championships – Todd Golden just did it at Florida – but in the 2026 high school class, Pope has the opportunity to flex Kentucky’s recruiting muscle and send a statement to the rest of the country.
Thompson isn’t the only top recruit that Pope is after. Kentucky has also shown interest in five-stars Caleb Holt, Taylen Kinney, and the No. 1 player in the country, Tyran Stokes. Landing any of them would be a signal to the other blue-blood programs that Pope isn’t just a high-level in-game tactician, but that he can draw top talent to Kentucky as well as his predecessor ever did.
Pope and his staff are a long way from closing the deal with Thompson, or any other five-star in the class, but with a clear designation as a basketball school in the football-heavy SEC, Kentucky is likely to have significantly more revenue-sharing money allocated towards men’s basketball than any other program in the conference.
A resource advantage on top of Pope’s impressive tactical acumen could do more than just restore Kentucky’s place as a national powerhouse. It could turn the Wildcats into a college basketball juggernaut.