Brandon Garrison 15 points were his most since playing against... Mark Pope?

On Saturday inside Rupp Arena, Brandon Garrison played arguably his best game yet as a Wildcat.

The sophomore center finished with 15 points on 7-8 shooting in Kentucky’s 80-57 blowout win over South Carolina. He knocked in just his sixth three-pointer of the season (more on that later) while tacking on two blocks, one rebound, and one assist with zero turnovers in his 20 minutes of action. It was his most action on the floor since playing 27 minutes all the way back on Jan. 7 against Georgia.

Garrison was feasting inside, accumulating most of his buckets through dunks and tough finishes at the rim. Kentucky’s ball handlers (shoutout to Lamont Butler‘s insertion back in the lineup) were finding him in the pick-and-roll and he was rewarding them with two points. Garrison had nine points in a little over a three-minute span during the second half. All six of his two-point makes were assisted, but he also spent plenty of time operating the offense from the top of the key.

“For him to be a zero-turnover guy as much as he handled the ball was really special,” Head coach Mark Pope said of Garrison postgame. “He was much better with his rolls tonight. Sometimes he starts floating around, but he rolled hard tonight and guys found him.”

"How about the big man!"
A pair of dunks from Brandon Garrison are today's @lgeku Power Plays of the Game. pic.twitter.com/roMZhgy1uy

— UK Sports Network (@UKSportsNetwork) February 8, 2025

What Pope saw from Garrison against South Carolina was probably similar to what he saw last season when the seven-footer was still at Oklahoma State. After all, Garrison’s performance on Saturday was his highest-scoring game since he faced Pope’s BYU squad in the Big 12. Garrison dropped a career-high 21 points as an Oklahoma State freshman against Pope and the Cougars on Feb. 17, 2024.

“When (Garrison is) hooping and it’s clicking, it’s huge for us. He’s gonna bring the energy every game,” Junior guard Otega Oweh said.

All that being said, it wasn’t a perfect afternoon for Garrison. After making his lone three-pointer against South Carolina, he was (understandably) tagged with a technical foul for taunting his opponent. Pope called him over afterward and did some quick sideline coaching. “Just him telling me keep my head,” Garrison said of the short conversation with Pope.

But that moment was more than just a poor decision by a young player who was happy to knock down a three. It’s symbolic of the way Garrison plays, and I mean that as a positive. He embraces trash talk. He wants to be Kentucky’s energy-injector. After Garrison hit that three with 11:16 to go in the second half, the Wildcats led by 13. UK finished the game on a 30-20 run.

“It’s all good Brandon. It’s all good,” Pope said when asked if there is good and bad with Garrison’s game. “We don’t love people in slices. In fact what makes people great is the whole thing, right? If you spend two seconds with Brandon Garrison, you can’t help but love him because he’s got a joy and a innocence and a passion about him and a willingness.”

And that’s why Pope will never tell Garrison to rein in his energy or his emotions — that’s part of what makes him go. More importantly, it feeds his teammates. Especially without Kerr Kriisa — who is *the* energy player — in the rotation, Kentucky needs someone like that to get the emotions flowing. Garrison is more than happy to take the torch.

“(Pope is) always looking for energy,” Garrison said. “Kerr is out. He was an energetic guy for the team so he asked me to step up and be that role. I feel like I gotta do that for the guys.”

If a technical foul is what it takes for Garrison to score 15 points every night, that’s a trade-off everyone will happily accept.