How the Cats explored the Commonwealth to become Kentucky's Team

You saw the photos of Mark Pope and the Kentucky Wildcats ziplining through Red River Gorge and riding the Natural Bridge Skylift — maybe some footage from players posting on social media. You heard about their stop at Miguel’s Pizza in Slade, meeting with patients at the ARH Cancer Center in Hazard, playing basketball with fans and signing autographs at Perry County Park.

And you definitely remembered the team’s lake day — because you were jealous about all of the tubing, wakeboarding, sliding, swimming, boating and jet ski-riding they did out on (and in) the water at Laurel Lake in Corbin, wishing you were right there with them soaking in these last few days of summer.

Now, you get to see how they did it all in hopes of Becoming Kentucky’s Team once again.

The second-to-none UK video and photo crew took you behind the scenes of the Wildcats’ weekend traveling around the state, showing how the team is coming together ahead of the 2025-26 season. It starts with avoiding bears and enjoying the scenery out in the “rogue wilderness,” as Jaland Lowe described it, then getting way too close to the edge at Natural Bridge.

They conquered their fears on the Skylift — “Oh, it’s straight down?” Malachi Moreno asked in terror — before doing the same on the zipline.

“I ain’t gonna lie, I’m nervous,” Jasper Johnson added.

Then you see the players interact with patients at the ARH Cancer Center, writing them words of encouragement and playing board games to help lift their spirits. That led to the meet-and-greet with fans, playing basketball and tennis while signing as many autographs and taking as many pictures as the community wanted. The players themselves took on archery and pickleball before wrapping things up on the water.

“We going on a lakeboat. Am I ready? No,” Denzel Aberdeen joked. “Everybody else is ready. I just wanna win number nine and go back to the courts, but that’s not an option right now, so imma just deal with it.”

How about Andrija Jelavic trying out his first s’more in the campfire to end the night? Mark Pope told him, “Just enjoy it. This is like the greatest American food. You are officially in America right now.”

Doesn’t get much better than that.

See it all for yourself below as this group becomes one Big Blue Nation will be proud of in 2025-26:

And the full photo gallery from the weekend, courtesy of UK Athletics:

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