Jayden Quaintance on the floor, Zach Tow is back, and more from Kentucky's early summer practices

Summer practices are underway for the 2025-26 edition of the Kentucky men’s basketball team. The Wildcats opened up the offseason fun with drill work on Monday before diving into a full-on practice session on Tuesday.

For those wondering about the summer practice guidelines, which the NCAA sets, teams are allowed a total of eight weeks of weight training, skill instruction, and development during the summer. They are limited to eight hours per week, only four of which can be spent on skill instruction. So there is restricted on-court time over the next two months — with a lot to learn as Mark Pope looks to incorporate several new faces into his system.

Though we’re only a couple of days into these summer practices, there have already been some notable takeaways.

Jayden Quaintance is moving around at practice

UK Athletics photographer Chet White was in the building for Tuesday morning’s practice. His photo gallery is filled with great action shots, including Pope riding the exercise bike, but we’re interested in what’s going on in the background. One of the first things you’ll notice? Arizona State transfer Jayden Quaintance, who is recovering from a torn ACL suffered in the spring, was out and about moving around during practice.

Quaintance has a long wrap covering his injured right knee, and it doesn’t appear as though he was actively participating in practice, but he was getting up shots and hanging around associate coach Mark Fox. There is no set timeline for a return to play for Quaintance, who underwent surgery in March, but the hope is he can be close to game-ready by September. The versatile 6-foot-9 forward is a projected lottery pick in the 2026 NBA Draft.

Considering he’s only a few months post-surgery, seeing him moving around is a good sign.

Walk-on Zach Tow is back for another year

Spotted in the background of a handful of pictures was Zach Tow, who was a walk-on during Pope’s first season coaching the Wildcats. The House settlement put the status of walk-ons on hold, but now that it’s been approved, roster limits can extend to 15 regardless of walk-on or scholarship status. Walker Horn‘s return actually puts Kentucky at 15 players for 2025-26, but since Tow was on the team last season, the House settlement allows him to be grandfathered in, meaning he doesn’t technically count towards the 15-player roster limit this season. On that note, Horn does not count toward the 15, either.

Anyways, Tow was seen rocking his #20 jersey, the same one he wore in 2024-25, in a couple of practice pictures. A product of Madisonville North Hopkins High School, he joined the team after being the best player out of walk-on tryouts that Pope hosted last offseason. Tow, who will be a senior in 2025-26, appeared in two games last season against LSU in the home finale and in the NCAA Tournament win over Troy.

Never a bad thing to have some extra bodies around, especially when that person is a Bluegrass native.

Andrija Jelavić coming to Lexington soon?

The only Wildcat not seen in these practice pictures was international commit Andrija Jelavić, who remains in Croatia but expects to join the fold soon. The 6-foot-11 stretch forward only recently wrapped up his season overseas with KK Mega Superbet. Jelavić even gave us a hint that his arrival in Lexington isn’t far away. When Kentucky posted a handful of Tuesday’s pictures to its Instagram account, Jelavić commented with the “soon” emoji.

Want more Kentucky Basketball intel? Join KSR Plus for access to bonus content and KSBoard, KSR’s message board, to chat with fellow Cats fans and get exclusive scoop.