No. 9 seed Kentucky men’s basketball was eliminated from the 2026 SEC Tournament after suffering a 71-63 loss to the No. 1 seed Florida Gators in the Quarterfinals.

After knocking off No. 16 seed LSU and No. 8 seed Missouri in the first two rounds, the Cats had a shot at taking down the mighty Gators again, a squad that they had already beaten by twice during the regular season.

Kentucky head coach Mark Pope rolled out his routine starting lineup: Otega Oweh, Denzel Aberdeen, Collin Chandler, Andrija Jelavic and Malachi Moreno.

The Cats won the tip but were unsuccessful on their first try down, as Chandler missed a 3-point shot, and on the other end, Florida’s Rueben Chinyelu missed a mid-range jumpshot, keeping the game scoreless. 

Florida’s Thomas Haugh was able to open the scoring after finishing a layup through contact and sinking his lone free throw. 

Moreno then responded by getting UK on the board on its second offensive attempt.

The Gators were able to outscore Kentucky 5-0 from that point on, forcing a quick timeout by Pope before the first media timeout occurred. 

After the timeout, Oweh nailed a mid-range jump shot, making the score 8-4, but again Florida stepped on the gas and held a 14-6 lead with 14:20 remaining in the first half. 

At that point, Kentucky had already coughed up four turnovers. 

The Cats, however, showed resilience, mounting an 8-0 run over the span of 0:44 seconds, courtesy of two made 3-pointers by Mo Dioubate and a dunk by Oweh.

Big Blue Nation was quickly revived and the Cats had the hot hand. 

Following that surge, at the 9:40 mark, Kentucky was able to knot the game at 20 following a made layup by Jasper Johnson.

However, by the 6:25 mark UK was back down, trailing 28-20 after the Gators punched back. 

At the tail-end of the first half, the Cats hit a wall, making just one of 11 field goal attempts while allowing the Gators to go on a 13-2 run over the span of six minutes. 

With 3:21 remaining, the Wildcats found themselves down 33-22. 

Kentucky went into the break trailing 37-28, shooting 10-30 from the field and 2-11 from deep while Dioubate led the Cats in first-half scoring with 12.

The closest Wildcat scorer was Oweh with six points.

Both sides had trouble finding the net at the start of the second half, taking 1:45 and at least two possessions to get going. Oweh found the first bucket of the half after he turned a smooth eurostep into a layup.

Florida was able to get its first second-half points due to two made free throws by Alex Condon following Oweh’s made layup.

At the first media timeout of the second half, Florida busted its lead open to 13 points, leading 45-32 courtesy of all the Gators’ eight second-half points coming from Condon. 

Kentucky regained some momentum shortly after, as Moreno and Aberdeen slammed back-to-back dunks, trailing 49-36 after that sequence. 

With 10 minutes remaining in the game, Kentucky trailed 54-43 after Chandler got his first 3-point field goal of the game to drop, at that point he was 1-3 from deep. 

Following Chandler’s triple, those Big Blue Nation members who traveled to Bridgestone Arena rose to their feet, doing everything they could to help out the Cats; however, a foul called on Chandler on the defensive end ruptured that momentum. 

Kentucky’s Trent Noah checked in with less than eight minutes to play, making his first appearance of the tournament after Chandler registered four fouls. 

UK was having a rough shooting day, shooting just 33.3% from the field and 18.8% from deep with 7:10 to go, but despite that, it trailed by just 12 points and had a shot at clawing its way back into the game if it got some shots to fall. 

Kentucky needed to manufacture a strong offensive push through the last seven minutes if it wanted to live to see another day in Nashville.

However, a technical foul was assessed against Oweh, and some built-up frustration from Pope, again, slugged any momentum it had been building. 

The Gators were also struggling offensively, going over eight minutes without making a field goal; however, they were able to stay intact with 10 made free throws during that span, while UK had trouble scoring.

Kentucky cut the deficit to eight points with just over three minutes to go when Aberdeen drew a charge, causing a vocal explosion from BBN, completely shifting the energy in its favor. 

Aberdeen then drew a foul and went 2-2 at the free-throw line, making the score 62-56 still in favor of Florida; BBN was loud and made its voice heard.

But, just when the momentum swung towards UK once more, Chandler got tagged with a foul call, which happened to be his fifth of the game, meaning he fouled out. Johnson, who had two points at that point, checked in for him. 

Haugh then drained a massive, momentum-killing, mid-range shot for the Gators with 1:38 remaining, elevating their lead back up to eight points. 

Aberdeen responded with a crucial 3-point shot that cut the deficit to four points with less than a minute to go.

However, Xaivian Lee nailed a 3-point shot for Florida, which ultimately put it in the driver’s seat.

The Gators were able to hold on down the stretch and move on to the semifinals. 

UK finished the game shooting 21-59 (35.6%) from the field and 5-23 (21.7%) from deep, while getting outrebounded 50-29.

Kentucky will await its seeding for the 2026 NCAA Tournament. Selection Sunday will take place this Sunday, March 15, at 6 p.m. EST. The show can be watched live on CBS.