{"id":148259,"date":"2025-08-15T16:36:18","date_gmt":"2025-08-15T16:36:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/148259\/"},"modified":"2025-08-15T16:36:18","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T16:36:18","slug":"mark-pope-updates-jayden-quaintances-return-timeline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/148259\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Pope updates Jayden Quaintance\u2019s Return Timeline"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\"><a href=\"https:\/\/ukathletics.com\/sports\/mbball\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Kentucky basketball<\/a> head coach Mark Pope gave an update on sophomore center Jayden Quaintance\u2019s recovery, speaking with Matt Norlander about the progress the young Wildcat is making following ACL surgery.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Pope emphasized that the priority is ensuring a full recovery for the 6-foot-10 forward.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">\u201cIt\u2019s really important he gets a full recovery, so it\u2019s going to be a little while. I have every expectation that he will play this season. I don\u2019t think he\u2019ll play all the games this season, but we\u2019ll see.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Quaintance, one of the youngest players in college basketball this season, has been progressing very well through all of his milestones with rehab. Pope highlighted that the next three weeks are critical for his development.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">\u201cHe\u2019s made great progress, and he\u2019s crossing off the benchmarks as he goes. He\u2019s in a really important three-week space for him right now where it\u2019s the first time we get to hit strength training head-on, and he\u2019s still not doing anything live-ish, or even close to it. But we\u2019re really going strength heavy, heavy, heavy the next three weeks. So we\u2019ll see how these next three weeks go.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Quaintance\u2019s return would provide a significant boost to the Wildcats\u2019 frontcourt, offering size, athleticism, and rim protection. While no official return date has been set, Pope\u2019s remarks suggest optimism that the sophomore will contribute later this season, potentially giving Kentucky an added weapon as SEC play heats up.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">As Kentucky fans continue to wait for updates, all eyes will be on how quickly Quaintance can get back to being 100% and how the Wildcats manage bringing him back to game action in the coming months.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kentucky basketball head coach Mark Pope gave an update on sophomore center Jayden Quaintance\u2019s recovery, speaking with Matt&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":148260,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[1339,1541,68136,1317,1337,1338,62,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-148259","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-kentucky-wildcats-basketball","10":"tag-kentucky-wildcats-basketball-injuries","11":"tag-ncaa","12":"tag-ncaa-basketball","13":"tag-ncaabasketball","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115033760534365048","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148259","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148259"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148259\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148259"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148259"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148259"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}