The Texas Longhorns beat the Kentucky Wildcats 82-78 during a game at the Moody Center in Austin, Texas, on Saturday, Feb. 15, 2025. By Ryan C. Hermens

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Game day: Texas 82, No. 15 Kentucky 78

Click below for more of the Herald-Leader and Kentucky.com’s coverage of Saturday night’s men’s basketball game between Kentucky and Texas in Austin, Texas.

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Kentucky was far short of its full complement of players Saturday night.

The Wildcats almost came out with a win anyway.

With three key players out of the lineup, UK led late in the second half before suffering an 82-78 loss to the  a sixth defeat in SEC play with six games still left in the regular season.

Kentucky (17-8, 6-6 SEC) was playing without Lamont Butler, Kerr Kriisa and Jaxson Robinson, who were all  Friday night and watched Saturday’s game from the bench.

The absences led to a new starting lineup for the Wildcats, with freshman Travis Perry — Kentucky’s reigning Mr. Basketball and the state’s all-time leading scorer in high school — getting his first college start.

Perry was joined by Otega Oweh, Koby Brea, Ansley Almonor and Amari Williams, and 15th-ranked UK was a 4.5-point underdog at tipoff against the Longhorns, who were playing without injured big man Arthur Kaluma, the team’s second-leading scorer and top rebounder.

The makeshift Kentucky lineup got off to a hot start, however, with Perry’s stepback 3-pointer giving the Wildcats an early 9-2 lead and prompting Texas head coach Rodney Terry to call a timeout before the first TV stoppage of the night.

The Longhorns (16-10, 5-8 SEC) battled back, tying the game by the second TV timeout and taking their first lead a little more than a minute after that.

After Kentucky’s 9-2 start, neither team led by more than five points in the first half, and UK freshman Trent Noah played a major role in keeping the Cats in a good place, with seven points, four rebounds and an alley-oop assist to Brandon Garrison — all before halftime.

UK led Texas 41-37 at the break.

The Cats jumped out to a seven-point lead early in the second half before enduring an 0-for-7 stretch of shooting from the field. By the time that dry spell ended, a 48-41 advantage had turned into a 56-53 deficit.

Kentucky ended up scoring six straight points — on baskets from Oweh, Williams and Andrew Carr — to take a 65-60 lead, but Texas battled back again and went ahead 71-70 with 2:31 left. The Longhorns extended that lead to 76-70 and then forced a turnover on a UK inbound pass to ice the victory.

Oweh scored 20 points to lead the Wildcats. Williams had 18 points and 12 rebounds. and Almonor joined them in double figures with 11 points.

Freshman star  — the SEC’s leading scorer with 19.3 points per game going into Saturday — had 15 points in the first half and surpassed his season average with more than 16 minutes left in the game. Johnson, a top-10 recruit in the 2024 class, finished with a career-high 32 points. Tramon Mark had 26 points for the Longhorns.

Earlier Saturday, the NCAA Tournament Selection Committee  teams, as of now, and the Wildcats were a 3 seed and No. 10 overall.

This was UK’s first game against the Longhorns in Austin. The Cats had played the SEC newcomers just twice in the past, with one of those matchups in Rupp Arena and the other at the Maui Invitational. UK won both of those games.

Kentucky will be back in Rupp for its next game, a rematch with the  at 7 p.m. EST Wednesday on SEC Network.

Vandy defeated UK 74-69 in Nashville last month. That was the final game Butler tried to play after suffering his shoulder injury, and he ended up sitting out Kentucky’s following three games. Carr was also sidelined for the Cats’ loss in Memorial Gym due to injury.

The Commodores have a 17-8 overall record with a 5-7 mark in the SEC, and they were projected as a 10 seed for the 2025 NCAA Tournament in the most recent  update. Vandy suffered an 81-76 loss at No. 5 Tennessee on Saturday.

This story was originally published February 15, 2025 at 10:31 PM.