What Braydon Hawthorne's commitment means for Kentucky

Thought Kentucky was done adding to the roster in 2025-26? Not quite. Mark Pope has picked up a commitment from 2025 four-star wing Braydon Hawthorne, a top-40 senior out of Beckley, West Virginia. The 6-9, 185-pound prospect picked the Wildcats over Duke, Pittsburgh, Virginia Tech and West Virginia on Tuesday.

He originally signed with WVU before reopening his recruitment in the spring, leading to an official visit to Lexington in mid-April. Hawthorne took visits to all five finalists before ultimately choosing Kentucky.

What is UK getting in the newest pledge and what does his addition mean for the program? KSR breaks it down.

One of the nation’s fastest-rising prospects

Hawthorne was unranked and unknown when he committed to West Virginia back in October. He held offers from Radford, Old Dominion, Ohio, UMBC, Florida Gulf Coast, Pepperdine and Mount St. Mary’s, so when his first high-major opportunity came along, he immediately took it.

He was a 3-star by December, then a 4-star ranked inside the top 50 by On3 at No. 48 overall by February — 247Sports had him at No. 70 at the time while ESPN and Rivals still had him unranked. Then Darian DeVries took the head coaching job at Indiana, leading to his decommitment and new recruitment as one of the top available high school prospects in the spring.

Today, he sits at No. 35 overall and No. 16 among small forwards as a blue-blood pledge.

A long-term development piece

The reason for his recent explosion? He’s a late bloomer who started as a guard, but grew to 6-9 with a 7-3 wingspan while keeping and building upon those skills. Now long and athletic with shooting and finishing abilities, you don’t have to watch long to see the pro upside. On the other hand, his growth spurt still left him at 185 pounds — and that’s probably generous — with a slender frame in need of serious weight training to handle the physicality of the SEC. The tools are obvious, but he’s still rail-thin with his expected rise to stardom coming down the road rather than right away in Lexington.

He’ll be given the chance to compete — the staff will play the guys who are ready to play — but Hawthorne will be on a development plan pushing for long-term rewards rather than immediate production. Anything the Wildcats can get out of him in year one is icing on the cake.

What does he bring to the table now?

What would that icing on the cake look like? If you’re wanting a best-case scenario, Hawthorne hitting the weight room hard and taking positive steps with his diet this offseason at Kentucky would go a long way. Outside of the obvious strength concerns, there is so much to like in terms of his shot-making, driving, finishing, passing and length on both ends. He’s a fluid athlete and lob threat who runs like a gazelle in transition — a perfect fit for this player-friendly system. You could throw him in there today and expect deflections, finishes at the rim and confident catch-and-shoot attempts without a serious drop-off in talent or athleticism. He’s got a lot of natural gifts with the rest of his body playing catch-up.

The vision here is former All-Star Brandon Ingram — or Kevin Knox, if you’re looking for a Kentucky-specific player comparison.

Is the roster officially complete?

Pope said in late April he was ‘scouring the planet’ for new Kentucky roster additions following Travis Perry’s unexpected departure: “We need to add a couple more pieces,” he confirmed.

That was for depth, though, adding, “Right now, we have our roster that is going to own the minutes on the floor. We have all of the pieces.”

Then he added Miami (OH) transfer Reece Potter — a Lexington native — to give the Wildcats 13 players to work with, assuming Otega Oweh returns for one final season in blue and white, as expected. At the moment, that’s the scholarship cap until the House settlement moves roster limits to 15 with no distinction between scholarship and walk-on status, clarity coming there as soon as this week with no anticipated changes to that verbiage.

Following Potter’s commitment, Pope told KSR the program ‘could have a little bit of movement’ in terms of new additions, ‘but I think we’re in a pretty good spot.’ A week later, Hawthorne proved to be that movement to push the total to 14, plus the potential for Walker Horn to return after entering the portal on April 22 — that’s the latest scuttlebutt around Lexington — to make it 15.

That puts a bow on one of the most complete rosters in college basketball, if you ask me.

Pope watched Hawthorne compete against Jasper Johnson

Looking for inspiration on this fit? Kentucky’s head coach actually watched him in person while taking on another future Wildcat — and now, teammate — in Jasper Johnson. He was competing in his homecoming event at Woodford County High School back in February, the Court XIV Classic, Johnson’s RWE team battling Hawthorne’s Huntington Prep squad in the matchup. Malachi Moreno was sitting courtside with Pope, too, taking in Johnson’s 31-point MVP performance as RWE pulled off the 71-70 victory.

Little did anyone know, Johnson, Moreno and Hawthorne would all be teammates a few short months later, set to move in as Wildcat freshmen together in June.

Funny how life works.