Kentucky center Brandon Garrison plans to enter NCAA Transfer Portal

Kentucky center Brandon Garrison plans to enter the NCAA Transfer Portal, On3’s Joe Tipton confirms. Garrison has one season of eligibility remaining.

Garrison made 36 appearances and five starts this past season. He averaged 4.7 points. 4.1 rebounds and 1.1 assists per game, while shooting 55.6% from the field and 23.5% from beyond the arc.

Garrison stepped up his game in the postseason. In Kentucky’s win over LSU in the SEC Tournament, Garrison tallied a career-high 17 points. Additionally, in the Wildcats’ first-round NCAA Tournament victory against Santa Clara, the 6-foot-10 big man notched 10 points, seven rebounds and six blocks.

Garrison largely served as Kentucky freshman center Malachi Moreno‘s backup in the 2025-26 season. In the prior campaign, Garrison came off the bench for Amari Williams.

Before transferring to Kentucky, Garrison spent his freshman season at Oklahoma State. He started in all but three of Oklahoma State’s 32 games. He averaged a career-high 7.5 points in 22.6 minutes per game.

Brandon Garrison played high school basketball at Del City (OK), where he was a four-star recruit. He was the No. 43 overall player and No. 5 center in the 2023 recruiting cycle, according to the Rivals Industry Rankings. He was a McDonalds High School All-American.

Kentucky posted a 22-14 overall record this season, along with a 10-8 mark in conference play. The Wildcats advanced to the second round of the NCAA Tournament, where they ultimately fell in a blowout loss against Iowa State. After the game, UK head coach Mark Pope discussed his program’s impending offseason.

“Retention is a big part of this, and we have good young players,.” Pope said. “You think about you’re starting a first-year center and a first-year power forward and a sophomore 2-guard.

“It wasn’t the plan coming into the season, but it’s what we ended up with, and those guys have gained some great experience and they’re going to get better and better and better. We’ll start there and kind of build out from there. We’ve done this for two years, and we’ll continue to do a good job at it.”

The NCAA Transfer Portal officially opens on April 7 and closes on April 21. The new 15-day window was enacted following a recommendation by the men’s basketball oversight committee. Athletes don’t have to commit to a new school by the April 21 deadline.

To keep up with the latest players on the move, check out On3’s Transfer Portal wire. The On3 Transfer Portal Instagram account and Twitter account are excellent resources to stay up to date with the latest moves.