Over the last several recruiting classes, the University of Kentucky Basketball program has come up short in terms of landing the “big fish” in either recruiting or the transfer portal.

But recently, head coach Mark Pope and his staff landed Milan Momcilovic — the top target in the entire transfer portal — from Iowa State to join their team for the upcoming season.

While many people clearly played a role in getting Momcilovic to Kentucky, former Wildcat Tyler Herro clearly had his fingerprints on the move.

Tyler’s dad — Chris — was Momcilovic’s coach back in AAU and (of course) was heavily connected to UK through Tyler back around the COVID years when Momcilovic was being recruited out of high school.

“Tyler reached out to me. Chris (Herro) and my dad are pretty good friends because they used to coach together on the EYB,” Momcilovic said during Thursday’s media scrum. “So, he was calling me, and he was obviously telling me, ‘Go to Kentucky. Go to Kentucky.’ I really like the Herro family. Obviously, I listen to them, but it was my decision at the end of the day.”

Though Kentucky never reached out originally back during his high school recruiting, they did come knocking most recently during this past summer, and with the help of Herro’s encouragement, Momcilovic will represent the Big Blue Nation this fall in Lexington for a chance to try and bring banner No. 9 home to UK.

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