Sometimes, the best updates on a player can come from the player himself. What a concept.
That’s the case for Kentucky Basketball big man Jayden Quaintance, who has been sidelined with a knee injury since early January and offered an insight into his recovery situation on Thursday in St. Louis.
It’s the same knee he tore his ACL in in February of 2025, which kept him out until December 21st after transferring to Kentucky this past offseason.
“Just focusing on rehab, trying to make sure everything’s
going well, keeping things on the up and up with my knee. Things have been going pretty well,” Quaintance said. “Trying to get rid of the swelling. I feel like we’ve been making progress.
“Haven’t been going as fast as I’d want to, obviously, but we’ve been making progress still.”
It’s been swelling in the knee that has kept him out of the lineup and rotation since two games into SEC play. He played in four games prior to that, including a memorable breakout performance against St. John’s at the CBS Sports Classic in Atlanta.
“We’ve tried a PRP shot, a steroid shot recently, I’ve taken different shots,” said Quaintance. “A lot of icing, a lot of different treatment things to try and reduce the swelling as much as possible naturally. Just getting rid of the swelling has been the main focus.”
Mark Pope said he doesn’t think Quaintance going to be able to cross the line to be able to play this weekend.
Quaintance admitted it’s not looking good for his chances of playing again this season.
“It depends on how fast we ramp up,” said Quaintance of a possible return. “I have the strength to retain, but the swelling has still kind of been lingering around. I haven’t done too much stuff on court in a long time, so I’d have to kind of reinitiate slowly into that, but it’s probably unlikely currently.”
So as expected, Kentucky will have to continue its season with Quaintance unlikely to suit up again.
