BREAKING: Mark Pope and UK basketball get commitment from top European prospect
Following Kentucky’s 78-65 NCAA Tournament loss to Tennessee on March 28, 2025, in Indianapolis, head coach Mark Pope and players Lamont Butler and Andrew Carr spoke to the media. (Source: NCAA | John Clay)
Looking ahead to the 2025-26 season, Coach Mark Pope has looked overseas to bolster his Kentucky basketball roster. On Saturday afternoon, UK received a commitment from Croatian big man Andrija Jelavic, a 6-foot-11 power forward. The news was first reported by ESPN.
Jelavic, who turns 21 in May, is regarded as one of the top European prospects choosing to play college basketball. He has spent the past two seasons with Mega MIS (also known as Mega Basket or Mega Superbet), a professional Serbian team competing in the AdmiralBet ABA League. This season, Jelavic has posted averages of 10.8 points, 7.4 rebounds, 1.4 assists, and 1.0 steals over 23 games, while shooting 50.3% from the field and 32.3% from three-point range on a high volume of attempts.
With a 7-foot-2 wingspan and strong floor-spacing abilities, Jelavic brings versatility and international experience, having also played with several Croatian youth national teams. Should he appear in a game for Kentucky next season, Jelavic will become the second Croatian to play for the Wildcats. The first was Zvonimir Ivisic, who spent one season at Kentucky under John Calipari before transferring to Arkansas and later joining Illinois for the 2025-26 season, where he will play alongside his twin brother Tomislav — a player Kentucky faced in last season’s NCAA Tournament.
What does Andrija Jelavic commitment mean for UK basketball roster?
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With the commitment of Andrija Jelavic, Kentucky now has 12 projected scholarship players for the 2025-26 basketball season. This includes five potential returnees from last year’s team that reached the Sweet 16 during Mark Pope’s debut season as head coach: freshman guards Collin Chandler and Travis Perry, freshman forward Trent Noah, sophomore center Brandon Garrison, and junior guard Otega Oweh.
The Wildcats have already secured four players through the NCAA transfer portal: Mouhamed Dioubate (sophomore forward from Alabama), Jaland Lowe (sophomore guard from Pittsburgh), Jayden Quaintance (freshman big man from Arizona State), and Kam Williams (freshman wing from Tulane).
In addition, two top-30 recruits from the high school ranks are set to join the program: left-handed guard Jasper Johnson and center Malachi Moreno, an in-state standout from Great Crossing High School who recently led his team to a state championship and earned McDonald’s All-American honors.
However, Kentucky recently lost a member of its 2025 recruiting class. Top-30 guard Acaden Lewis, also a lefty, decommitted from the program on Thursday night. The Wildcats remain in the mix for another elite high school player, five-star power forward Nate Ament from Virginia, who is considering Kentucky along with Arkansas, Duke, Louisville, and Tennessee.