Mark Pope gives positive injury update on Kam Williams

On Friday night, the basketball season officially got underway with the Kentucky Wildcats welcoming in Travis Ford and his Little Rock Trojans to Rupp Arena for the first exhibition of the 2026-27 college hoops season.

After Kentucky’s 69-49 win, Mark Pope was asked about one of the players we didn’t see on the floor Friday. 

Pope provided a positive update on Kam Williams, noting that he is slowly recovering from the foot injury for which he underwent a second, more extensive surgery in July.

It’s an uphill battle, but Williams may be near the top of that hill in his recovery. 

“Kam had imaging again today. It was extremely positive,” Pope said after the win. “He’s on course. We’re cautiously optimistic because we’ve been through this once. We’re hopefully talking about several weeks to a month, not months and months.”

Pope also said Williams is running and jumping now as he continues to progress toward full clearance for practice.

“He had a really good workout today,” said Pope. “He was running and jumping in a very, very controlled place. But as we’ve all seen together with Kam, we have to proceed really cautiously, and we’re not going to rush it. This is going to be a long-term recovery, but when he gets back, he’s going to he’s going to make a massive difference for us.”

We expected Williams to miss the start of the exhibition season, but the team is hopeful he will be ready for the start of the regular season, which begins November 3 vs. Manhattan.

But for the next two preseason games vs. Texas Tech and UCF, we shouldn’t expect to see Williams in action.